Cataguase's Train
This installation was conceived and developed in 2 days, during the UFMG Cataguases Winter Festival. Cataguases is an historic town, considered as the birthplace of the Brazilian Modernism in architecture. Throughout the city there are several buildings and artwork by famous modernist artists and architects such as Oscar Niemeyer, Cândido Portinari, Burle Marx, etc. This gives the town a very inspiring look. Surrounding the city there are beautiful woodlands and rivers. However all the peace is regularly broken by a train that passes in the middle of the town, many times per day, carrying aluminium ore. I found this to be a very unpleasant event since the train makes a lot of noise, leaves trails of dust and passes dangerously close to cars and pedestrians. After so many years, the train became interwingled with the town's life. The goal of this installation was to play with the duality I saw in the city: nature vs progress. The money that came from mining brought prosperity and culture to the city, but at what cost?
As in the real life, the installation revolves around the city master clock: the train. By raising the left or right arms the user can choose between a orange or a green train. The green represents the choice for the nature over progress. The orange train represents the choice of culture and progress. As the train passes through the landscape it changes according the perspective of the interactor. Cultural, industrial or nature elements unfold as in a pop up book. The sun, sky and grass were inspired in modernist paintings by Tarsila do Amaral.
The gesture recognition used a kinect and a C# standalone program. The skeleton position was forwarded using OSC to the exhibition application, that was built with Processing.
As in the real life, the installation revolves around the city master clock: the train. By raising the left or right arms the user can choose between a orange or a green train. The green represents the choice for the nature over progress. The orange train represents the choice of culture and progress. As the train passes through the landscape it changes according the perspective of the interactor. Cultural, industrial or nature elements unfold as in a pop up book. The sun, sky and grass were inspired in modernist paintings by Tarsila do Amaral.
The gesture recognition used a kinect and a C# standalone program. The skeleton position was forwarded using OSC to the exhibition application, that was built with Processing.