Art au Naturel

1,700 people participated American artist Spencer Tunick’s adaptation of Richard Wagner’s “der ring des nibelungen”, or The Ring. The work, a live sculptural performance, was created for the commencement of Munich’s 2012 opera season. Naked volunteers were painted red or gold and continuously directed to move or be stationary to execute his vision. Tunick has been creating live, nude works since 1992, challenging the belief that nudity must always be sexual along with changing the way the public views and interacts with art in a public space. Pictures are below along with a video (skip to :21)!

The Ring was organized and photographed by Max-Joseph Platz and commissioned by the Bavarian State Opera. Pictures via here and here. You can view more of Tunick’s installations on his website.

Reach for the Clouds

“Lying down on a hill with your pupils filled with the endless blue sky, perspective of your eyesight suddenly gets distorted and clouds drift at the top of your nose. You stretch your arms up to the sky to touch the clouds but can’t reach. Another world right above your head, clouds. Today I visualize my colorful cloud of words right in front of your eyes. Touch the pink clouds drifting on a giant fabric screen, reminisce your favorite childhood clouds of dreams. I spent countless sleepless nights just to realize my unproductive and only romantic cloud of words. But, isn’t it nice if we could feel the clouds at our fingertips?”

So begins Everyware’s description of their interactive installation, Cloud Pink. The installation, located in Seoul, was created by projecting an image onto a large, suspended fabric screen that responds to touch, allowing viewers to achieve a childhood (and current) dream: to touch the clouds. Everyware is a Korean computing group comprised of Hyunwoo Bang, assistant professor at Seoul National University, and Yunsil Heo, who has an MFA degree from UCLA. For all you tech geeks, Cloud Pink was produced using Processing, Kinects, GLSL, and projectors. Be sure to check out the videos below as well.

Photos/videos via Everyware’s website, here, and here.

Sensing Smiley

The Fühlometer, or Feel-O-Meter, was an interactive installation created by artists/designers Julius von Bismarck, Benjamin Maus, and Richard Wilhelmer to display the overall mood of a city. The Fuhlometer was comprised of a complex system which read the emotions on passerby’s faces (sad, indifferent, or happy), interpreted them, and visualized them, all in real-time.

Photos from Wilhelmer’s website and here.