Harvestworks is pleased to partner with Experimental Intermedia to present this performance of Julian Knowles (Australia).

Date: Thursday December 14, 2023 @ 7 pm

Location: 596 Broadway Suite 602 New York NY 10012. 212-431-1130

‘Solar Halo’ is a new work for live internet data in performance that explores the real time dynamics of weather systems. Using custom developed software, the project draws upon live data from sixteen atmospheric weather stations – eight across the Australian Alpine Country and eight across New York City.  Live weather data then drive an audio-visual system with which the performer interacts.

With the arrival of the internet and public data streams, new opportunities have arisen to explore the ways in which real-time (or live) data may be deployed in an art work. This recent technical development has opened the possibility of art works being responsive to live internet data, thus extending the notion of context responsive art into the datasphere so that artworks may become ‘internet enabled’.

Climate is inextricably linked to notions of the Anthropocene – an epoch in which humans have impacted global ecosystems. Given the struggle to make science heard within public discourse around climate change, there is a need to connect people to the underlying facts around climate. The creative deployment of data provides and opportunity to communicate the challenges that fragile climate systems face as a result of human activity.

The project engages with Timothy Morton’s notion of the ‘hyperobject’. These are large scale structures above humanity that are difficult to comprehend due to their sheer vastness. Climate change is a hyperobject, as is the internet. The project brings these two hyperobjects together to help us comprehend the apparently incomprehensible, essential in any effort to mobilise action against climate change.

Initial creative development for the work is supported by the Bogong Centre for Sound Culture via their artist residency program.

Event link

Project partners:

Experimental Intermedia Foundation, NYC USA

Bogong Centre for Sound Culture, Australia