Bump

Brightonians, get yourselves down to the Fabrica gallery post haste (you remember: the pierced church).

There’s an exhibition running right now called "Bump". Here’s the gist of it:

There’s a wooden walkway inside the Fabrica building. There is a corresponding wooden walkway on a street in Vienna (down by the Kunsthistorisches museum). Both of these walkways are connected via the internet.

When someone steps on a plank on one of these walkways, a signal is immediately sent to the other walkway via the internet. The corresponding plank on the other walkway jumps, bumps. vibrates or whatever. It’s a magic combination of bandwidth and compressed air.

There’s also a webcam on the street in Vienna. The signal from this webcam is sent to a video wall inside the Fabrica building in Brighton.

The end result is fun, fun, fun. Jessica and I spent ages down there today. Together with the other visitors to the exhibit, we had a ball trying to freak out/interact with/play with the passers by in Vienna.

The exhibit is running until October 20th. Don’t miss it.