every now and then I check how my italian friends are doing work-wise, and sometimes I am suprised.
limiteazero, my italian pals in Milan, had an installation commissioned by BlackBerry® for SMAU 2005.
SMAU is a big “new technology faire” that happens every year in Milan.
Going there is sometimes worth it, but never anything special, except this time.
I regret not having been there cause this would have been worth a close look.
This installation, commissioned by BlackBerry®, is comprised of 4 micro environments, corresponding to the 4 BalckBerry® keywords: liberation, innovation, interaction, communication; as a whole, it represents the attempt to build a spatial version of the ‘always on’ experience, the permanent online connection as the Blackberry device is always connected and relies on e-mail push technology.
The installation wants to establish a connection between the ‘physical’ and the ‘digital’: the digital connection makes the 4 physical micro-environments, always connected to the wireless network, dynamic and reactive like a single organism.
During presentation days, visitors are asked to write e-mails related to one of the BalckBerry® keywords; 4 different visual clients, running inside the cubes, turn the texts of the e-mails into a graphic processing. Some keyframes are printed, and can be seen next to the monitors. On the opposite wall, 4 BlackBerrys also receive the e-mails, enhancing the ‘online’ environmental character through the lighting and the sounds generated when receiving messages.
The ‘engine’ of the cubes is manifest, as the electronic components have been assembled on their outer surface.
The thin diaphragm that screens off the outside ‘electronic engine’ from the image enjoyable from inside the cube, stands as just a settlement of an environment, that even if with its own materiality is perceived as continuous and transparent.
The shift from one cube to another provides a journey through a single fragmented environment, where to experience a borderland: a physical pulsing environment related to the data no-place, the digital no-place.
bb_write has been first exhibited at SMAU 2005, Fiera of Milan. Next stage: Milan, Madrid.
web site: bbwrite.org
commissioned by: BlackBerry®
general coordination: MGM digital