HOT AIR

Publicity

2009-11-14T03:47:00.000-08:00

HOT AIR shot from the Timisoara Opera House

radio interview on "Detroit Today" on 11-11-09

I was interviewed on the local NPR radio station a couple of days ago about HOT AIR. It has been a bit of a re-entry whirlwind, but I was quite happy to get the work noticed a bit more, so I did it. The show, "Detroit Today" on local NPR was looking back to the fall of the Berlin wall and the end of communism thoughout eastern Europe that followed. (I am about three-quarters of the way through the "tape")

I am about to write an essay on the project. I have been preparing it in my mind for quite a while now, but yesterday I had to make some decisions about the course that this story will now take because I am writing an explanatory press release for design publications. I don't often think of publicity as a good thing, but in the course of having to jump into the press to talk about my work, I have had to draw conclusions about the project which have forced me to be focused again on what I was trying to achieve. And here's the thing, for a while now I've been less open or forthcoming about the work. This didn't happen out of malice but rather out of inexperience... and I'm not sure it could have happened any other way... but I have been guarded about my thoughts and intentions with the work because of my inability to predict the resulting outcomes. Would I still be allowed to go to Romania? Would Timisoara still embrace, support, and promote the work? Would there be sympathy from the public? In the end, and in retrospect, it seems likely that none of my fears would have materialized and, in fact, that much of the paranoia went the way of the communist regime. So, seemingly I could have said a bit more... and soon I will.

VIDEOS from the final night

2009-11-13T04:53:00.000-08:00

blue stop from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

dancing in my head from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

chromocranium 2 from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

moving air

2009-11-05T22:40:00.000-08:00

Videos! You can see how the head feels and looks with people inside. This was from Wednesday night and we had many visitors. The shadow projections were great even for us as we had never tested the piece at night.

blue from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

This second video, from Wednesday morning, shows the rocking motion of the piece in the low winds. The head really feels like it's waking up from a long sleep. There's a jackhammer in the background which coincides with some of the movement and we thought sounded like snoring. On this day and the day before we learned a lot about how to manage the movement due to wind, so now we have it down, but we did incur one tear in the bottom.Now I'm thinking of using this movement in the conception of another piece... hmmmmmm... kinetic inflatables.

waking up in eastern europe from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

This last viedo is a time lapse animation of the head as it was illuminated last night. We asked our lighting guys here (Bogdi and Alex!) to use two different lights and to keep them moving as an experiment. The music scoring was obviously added later. We chose this song simply because we thought the beat went and it made us smile, but now that I think about it, this song has some capitalist warnings, no?

chromocranium from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

Images from Wednesday, NOV 4 PART I (daytime)

2009-11-05T06:44:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone! This is Le, pretending to be Anca. Yesterday was a very exciting day for us. The weather was a bit dreary in the morning, but contrary to wunderground.com's predictions, the skies cleared and wind speeds were perfect, allowing us to inflate. We had a lot of people stop by to ask us questions, to go inside the head, and to tell us their stories. It was really great. We even had a visit from the mayor and a group of government officials including a US senator.

Also, Hot Air is now on Flickr! Visit to view more pictures of our trip.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hot_air2009/

government officials inside the head

Alex and Bogdan, guys who have been helping us out, everyday

view from inside out

view from outside in

excited children going inside the head

images from Wednesday NOV 4 PART II (Nightime)

2009-11-05T06:31:00.000-08:00

Here some images from our installation last night.... more to come if our connection holds out from outside where we are sitting. enjoy and write to us and tell us what you think!

i forgot to mention the graffiti

2009-11-03T08:52:00.000-08:00

There will be some prominent graffiti artists in Piata Victoriei today and tomorrow. Because much of the art of the revolution was graffiti and much of it was lost in the months and years that followed, the idea is that the artists are using that mode of expression to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the revolution.

cool. I will develop my tag tonight...

International media frenzy

2009-11-03T05:38:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately the winds today were too high to install, so are waiting until tomorrow when there is better weather predicted.
HOWEVER...
I did get to participate in a press conference where the mayor of Timisoara, Gheorghe Ciuhandu, introduced our project, and then I presented it in a bit more depth (in english, whew!) Of course, I forgot to say some things that were important to me, but mostly I think it went well. Afterward, I was interviewed by the national Romanian media (Ava stood beside me the whole time) and am wondering if I'll see myself on the news tonight... autographs later.

Here are some of the women who work at the city hall. Lavinia, the one on the left is the one who helped me extensively. She was a real champion for the project in Romania, finding sponsors and publicizing the whole event. She also served as my translator and has helped create and distribute schedules. She has been a real treasure throughout the process. Thank you, Lavinia.

we're in Timisoara

2009-11-03T05:04:00.000-08:00

We made it here Sunday night. Timisoara! We traveled by train from Bucharest for nine hours and arrived at about 7:30 in the evening. The best part of the trip was getting close to the Danube. At times the train was riding right along side the water. We were losing the light, but this made the whole scene even more intense. I was supposed to get some work done, but spent the whole time with my eyes on the landscape. I had forgotten the pleasure of riding on a train through the country. Speaking of trains, ours was very good. Gone are the old cars, we rode in a nice new car with very comfortable seats that reclined. We also had electrical power.

Timisoara is quite lovely and the square we are on, Piata Victoriei (Victory Plaza), is really large and, in my opinion, the most beautiful of the public squares here.

We spent all day Monday preparing the inflatable for its presentation Tuesday. This meant unpacking the crate, setting up all of the electricity, and adding our new and improved anchors. This took about four hours but all went well. After a bite we returned and inflated on the square for the first time. The winds were a bit higher than we liked but we managed to secure all of the anchors in place. The head looked great even with the protective fencing around it.

HOT AIR in Timisoara!

2009-10-22T07:49:00.000-07:00

The piece has made it to Romania without problems. No customs issues. We thought it might get hung up along the way because of the unusual contents. In the past there would have been greater difficulty moving things in and out of the country. This happened not because the contents were illegal or controversial, but because the old system was suited for corruption. Today, this piece arrived as it would have in any other place of "free" exchange. It was checked in and allowed to pass. The amount of access to goods and services is perhaps one measure of a democratic, uh, trajectory... In any case, I am encouraged.

Below are some pictures from Timisoara's city hall where it is waiting for us to arrive and assemble. (Thank you Lavinia!) It's a little funny to see the box there so far away when it was here only a week ago. Further proof that the world is small these days........

The next posts should be of us traveling to get there and then assembling and mounting the piece. We leave in one week. I will update here and on facebook about our activities, so stay tuned..

Goodbye Hot Air

2009-10-14T14:05:00.000-07:00

Today we packed and readied the crate that Genn built for the shipping of Hot Air for Romania. This last step has taken a long time to arrive with many lessons and quirky anecdotes along the way. In the end, those stories will be as much, if not more, of the project than the piece itself. I can't quite tell them yet though because I don't want to influence the reception of the work....... Here's how we spent the day:

Inspectors von Beulow

2009-10-14T13:26:00.000-07:00

At the U-M inflation test we were lucky to have the guarding services of the the two brave von Beulow brothers. They tested the seams, air pressure, weight, and anchoring of the head with their own bodies. all the while keeping the crowds under control. Thank you von Beulows!

Inspctors von Beulow from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

video from U-M set up

2009-10-14T13:10:00.000-07:00

here's the head as mounted on Monday, October 5th. I didn't shoot very much, but this clip shows the amount of rolling and scrunching the head makes when there's a bit of wind.

Heavy Breathing from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

a shot from inside of our house on the second floor

2009-10-04T15:03:00.000-07:00

it's official! we can blow our head up

2009-09-30T04:51:00.000-07:00

you're still invited, but now on MONDAY!

where: Palmer Field (400 Washtenaw Ave.), University of Michigan
when: MONDAY OCTOBER 5, 3:30 - 6:00

come out and say hello........

from above

2009-09-26T06:21:00.000-07:00

here's a screen cap from multimap which happens to have caught our project while inflated in the backyard of our house! Thanks to Karl D. for alerting us to it. Thanks to multimap for waiting to take the picture until we were fully up.

(Thanks too to all of you who thought this was real... It's big, but not that big... sorry for any confusion.)

Feeling small

2009-09-19T10:35:00.000-07:00

further inflations

2009-09-19T10:22:00.000-07:00

PART I: Unfurling from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

PART II: Blowing it up from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

inflatohistory

2009-09-19T10:08:00.000-07:00

A small catalogue of images of inflatable projects...

ANT FARM

BOTSCHUIVER & SHAW

CHRISTO

ZOE WALKER

HAUS RUCKER CO.

HUONG NGO

KENGO KUMA

OTTO PIENE

POWERMOON

ALEX ROCHAS

preview of the interior

2009-09-16T19:29:00.000-07:00

just a preview...

slow progress

2009-09-16T19:21:00.000-07:00

We are moving along, but couple of things have slowed our progress: I started teaching classes again last week, we decided our fan was too big and have to send it back and wait for the new smaller one (hopefully here by tomorrow), we decided to change the position of the opening through which people enter, plus we are so close to being finished that we are having termination anxiety. Anyway, our new estimated day of completion is Friday. (We are actually finished with the inflatable, but need now to add anchor points and a funnel for the wind tunnel...) So... I thought I'd post images of the last workplace: the garage. This was the worst of them all as it was the smallest and most crowded and the inflatable was huge by then. Good thing we progressed to this space gradually or maybe Le would have quit her job.

In the meantime today we replaced the bottom of the neck. It wasn't too time consuming, but then again we have a lot of experience under our belts by now. Here's Le cutting out the form in the driveway.

Our yard has taken a beating in the process of building the inflatable. here's a big patch of brown grass that has developed as a result of the plastic laying on top of it for only a day or two. The problem wasn't the lack of sunlight, but the heat gain. The plastic traps so much heat on a sunny day it's amazing... The calculations I did to size the fan showed that a majority of the concern here (like 90%) was heat gain from the sun and my lawn proved it...

First Test Video

2009-09-12T16:24:00.000-07:00

This video doesn't capture the inflation, but thought I'd post it for a better feel for the piece... Tomorrow we are slated to finish and inflate for real.

Inflato Test 1 from HOT AIR 2009 - Anca T on Vimeo.

Inflation First Tests

2009-09-12T09:45:00.000-07:00

The head is not quite finished. We still have to put the bottom of the neck on. But that's it, so we decided for fun to try and inflate it. We have been working on it so long without any conception of what it would really look like blown up that we just couldn't wait anymore. Here the first images of it being blown up. (video in the next post... tune in later today)

These shots are from late in the afternoon yesterday, so the light was quite nice. We didn't fill it up completely with air because I was in the back holding down the remaining open area, but this gives you an idea of what it will look like eventually. The only tweaking I think we will need to do is in the face to get the nose and lips to be slightly more pronounced (look at picture no.2 - the nose is a bit too flat for example.) This will require some small internal cords.

The deflation starts

Our (big) Fan

2009-09-12T08:57:00.000-07:00

This is the fan we are using:

Schaefer's Versa-Kool Circulation fan VS36VKM. It has a 36" diameter and it's not too loud really... I love it!

The Big Head - Step 5: Assembly

2009-09-11T06:18:00.000-07:00

Once all of the pieces were sealed into "parts", we bagan assembling the inflatable. The size became difficult to manage and filled up my entire backyard, which is pretty big.

And this is about where we are today... The blog now continues in real time...

The face and side of head in progress

The Big Head - Step 4: Sealing the pieces

2009-09-11T06:11:00.000-07:00

After all 147 pieces were cut we began sealing the pieces into the subparts. We used regular household irons and parchment paper. The polyethylene requires very low heat to seal, so the irons were ideal.

Household irons seal two peices of plastic into one in seconds

Workspace at the University of Michigan

First pieces sealed into a "part"

Workspace at home

The Big Head - Step 3: Making the pieces

2009-09-11T05:39:00.000-07:00

We began by cutting 110 4' x 14' sheets of plastic. (This is the end of the pile)

Then we traced 147 pieces onto the sheets.

..and cut out the pattern by hand. Using laser cutters became cost prohibitive because of the sizes of the pieces (and the size of our budget.)

Le Nguyen doing the heavy labor

The Big Head - Step 2: Models

2009-09-11T04:30:00.000-07:00

After we had the pattern we made two models. The first was a small paper version to check dimensions and shape. The second was a 4' long model made of 4 mil polyethylene, the same material as the final, and inflatable.

The paper model.

The whole family got into it.

The polyethylene model. This model's pieces were all cut on a laser cutter.

From the interior

The Big Head - Step 1: Constructing the pattern

2009-09-11T04:14:00.000-07:00

Eventually I decided the early studies were too abstract to symbolize an event in which so many had participated. The piece had to be accessible by many. Additionally, I thought the monument should be inhabitable. The experience of moving inside of the piece could become a way to change an initial reaction to the piece from the exterior. So, the monument took on the shape of the head of a toppled statue.

The head itself is of a generic man, an everyman, to reflect the populace that made the revolutionary changes possible in Romania. It is on its side, toppled, as a critique of the events that ensued after the initial rise of the people, which in effect neutralized much of the revolutionary action.

Constructing the pattern.

To get the form the head of a mannequin is covered in multiple layers of latex. Then it is subdivided along lines of greatest height difference and lines of the facial features.

The latex mold is then cut open and further sliced to flatten out the pattern shapes. These shapes were scanned into the comuter and traced into drawings which could be manipulted.

Early Studies II

2009-09-11T03:40:00.000-07:00

This set of inflatbles would be helium-filled also, but held by two strings each. fixing the position of the mass more firmly.

Early Studies

2009-09-11T03:36:00.000-07:00

The first round of studies utilized mylar balloons to create the form and space of the monument. From the beginning inflatables were, on the one hand, a pragmatic response to the distant setting while at the same time had an atmosphere of frivolity and optimism which felt appropriate for this particular project.

mylar balloons each on one string, would move according to the wind.

Hot Air Project Background

2009-09-06T11:36:00.000-07:00

In June 2009 I wrote a grant proposal requesting funding assistance for a project commemorating the 20th anniversary of the fall of the communist regime in Romania. The following is an excerpt from the grant proposal:

PROJECT BACKGROUND

I.
Toward the end of December in 1989 an unusually warm weather pattern settled over Timisoara, Romania. Normally the temperatures in this region average at 3° C/37° F for this time of year. However, in the week from December 15th to the 22nd, which was to be remarkable in many other ways, the daily temperatures reached much higher (up to 18° C/64° F). It’s likely that this warmth assisted the brewing political revolution by allowing greater numbers of people to be out on the streets for long periods of time, raising each other’s courage to stand against the totalitarian regime of Nicolae Ceausecu. The temperatures helped people withstand the water from the fire hoses of the riot police trying to disperse the growing crowds. It also allowed for more elderly people and children to populate the squares giving a more complete and powerful image of the citizenry to itself and the world beyond. And it is likely, too, that the temperature outdoors those days and nights was more comfortable than that indoors due to the government’s newly implemented system of heat rationing, that extraordinarily cruel practice of reducing the temperature of the hot water coming from the city’s central heating plants, which made average winter-time indoor temperatures a frigid 8° C/46° F. (Siani-Davies. p. 253)

The presence of unexpected warmth (outdoors) coupled with the missing expected warmth (indoors) cannot possibly cause or even trigger a political revolution 43 years in the making. It is, for sure, quite a small fact in a very big story, but perhaps a critical one. The ability to be on the street and, more importantly, to stay on the street for a long period of time contributed significantly to the uprising in Timisoara. On December 16th several hundred people had gathered at the home of priest Laszlo Tokes to block his deportation. The longer they stayed the more the crowd and the fervor grew. With each ensuing day, regardless of the government’s violent attempts at dispersal, the city’s largest public square (Opera Plaza), where the protests finally moved, became more and more full, the rhetoric more and more heated. Shouts had changed from “We are not leaving!” to “Down with Ceausescu!” On December 20th the city of Timisoara was officially declared to be in a state of emergency. The inability of the government to remove its citizens from the street constituted a loss of control and ultimately a loss of the government itself.

Opera Square (later renamed Piata Victoriei, Victory Square)

17 December 1989

II.
Or did it? The Romanian Revolution in 1989 was one of the most contested changes of power in the Eastern Bloc that year. In the end, many weren’t sure they even wanted to call it a revolution [1]. The controversies surrounding the events in Romania are twofold. On the one hand much scorn has been directed at the methods used to popularize and promulgate the revolution as it was occurring. In particular, the revolutionaries are criticized for the widespread use of popular media, especially television, to greatly exaggerate the spectacle in order to create and then manipulate the sympathetic international viewership. The most egregious transgressions occurred in the reporting of casualties both in numerical data [2] and, even more dramatically, in staged images [3].

On the other hand, and to a much larger extent, the Romanian revolution has been repeatedly denounced on the basis of its evinced results, or lack there of. The modern idea that a revolution should be, rather than restorative as the name implies (Arendt), transformative and liberating, has been standing model since the American and French revolutions of the late eighteenth centuries. This model suggests deep ideological shifts along with the obvious changes of leadership personnel. In Romania, what may have started as a legitimate popular rebellion has not been fully trusted because the leadership that immediately took over was comprised of people formerly a part of the old regime. Whether this reversion was pre-planned or resulted from an opportunistic hijacking midstream is less relevant than the resulting sense of governmental treachery that plagued the country then and now, simply more hot air. Nevertheless, the leaders have been freely elected implying that their governmental experience has at minimum placated the domestic revolutionary demands for democracy.

III.

"The astounding truth of the matter is that much of the glorious Romanian ‘Revolution’ was, in fact, a staged play, a revolution between quotation marks. Let me also say for all that, there were heroes, martyrs, and true revolutionaries. A mass uprising did take place, but it was skillfully manipulated by the men who run Romania today.” (Codrescu, 1991, p.205)

So, there was a revolution... and there wasn’t. Even now, twenty years later, this continues to be the prime debate. Consider the title of the recent Romanian movie, A Fost sau n-a Fost? (Literally: It Was or it Wasn’t?) But is this the only lasting residue – whether it happened or not – as if this could be resolved with a neat yes or no anyway? If we continue to compare the Romanian events of 1989 to those two hundred years prior, it’s likely we will not find apt parallels to consider it a genuine revolution. And yet blood was spilled, leaderships changed hands, and ideological aspirations drifted toward democracy. How should the memory of the revolutionary events of December 1989 be honored twenty years later? The lasting legacy of the Romanian revolution does not grow out of anything that did (or did not) happen in December 1989, but rather out of the fact that it could happen at all.

PROPOSAL

HOT AIR is the proposal for the temporary installation of a large inflatable and inhabitable monument in honor of the twentieth anniversary of the 1989 Romanian revolution. Its site is intended to be in Piata Vicoriei, Timisoara, an expansive public space and site of the first large demonstrations that lead to the fall of the dictatorship of Nicolae Ceausescu. The monument is meant to be playful and wondrous: large enough to be inhabited by visitors to the site but lightweight enough to be easily shipped internationally, readily mounted on site, and perhaps moved about. It will be constructed of heat-sealed polyethylene plastic sheeting, anchored, and inflated with household fans circulating enough warm air pressure to keep it structurally afloat. It will be erected and remain open throughout the duration of the American-Romanian Music Festival: Nov 1-5, 2009 (dates to be confirmed). It will be a venue for visitation by the public, small concerts, planned talks, and impromptu events. Schedules and updates for the events will be announced via traditional media, social network sites, and text messaging networks. At the end of the festival HOT AIR will journey back to the United States for exhibition on the campus of the University of Michigan.

HOT AIR is not meant to valorize the revolution or admonish the subsequent usurpations. Such works have already been and will continue to be created. Rather, HOT AIR is envisioned as a celebration - a making of an object/space (and series of events) - inspired by the improbable and infectious spirit of the 1989 uprising that changed the course of history. The lasting legacy, and therefore the object of the memorialization here, is the possibility that lies in collective action and the less-than-perfect results. The contradictions of optimism AND instability inherent in Romania’s political change are reflected in the mass, material, and construction of a symbolic image filled with HOT AIR.

collage of design proposal

[1] Many authors have referred to the Romanian revolution as a Coup d’etat, a Palace Coup, and an insurrection

[2] By December 18th some domestic news outlets were reporting as many as 10,000 dead in Timisoara alone. On December 24th the figure had risen to 60,000 across the entire country and was used as factual evidence against Ceausescu in his pre-execution trial. In the end however, the official total death counts for the revolution average are 689 dead and 1200 wounded for the entire country. (Codrescu 1991 and Siani-Davies)

[3] Photographs and videos were shot of bodies dug out of public cemeteries and positioned to look as if they had been massacred the day before.