╳ ‘Whiskers In Space’ is an installation by Kerstin Ergenzinger. The ‘whiskers’ in question are mechanisms that sense and measure disquietude. Similar to the whiskers of a cat, they serve both as feelers and antennae. The sculptures are connected to sensors that measure the fine air currents in the room and they adopt this noise as their own slightly nervous state of being and mirror and transform the changes in the air currents. At the same time, their movements feed impulses back into its immediate surroundings causing the installation to alternate between feedback and reaction. ╳ Ms Ergenzinger was invited as an international Artist in Residence for the 5th Digital Art Festival Taipei 2010. Her work brought together, amongst other things, polypropylene, muscle-wire, silicon, steel and her custom electronics to create makeshift 'whiskers' connected to sensors measuring fine air currents in the room.
╳ Kerstin Ergenzinger’s work envisions a conceptual and material framework for the technologies of inspection, visual transfer and architecture. Her installation work raises questions of exactly what is ‘lived’ space, what is our body, and by what measures do we judge it? In Ms Ergenzinger’s work, futuristic landscapes pulse with viewers, machines, sound and architectural space interconnected to existing space by illumination and speed; and by surveilling moving information at mixed velocities, viewers can question just what is being measured, and who is in control.
╳ Mark making is particularly important to Kerstin Ergenzinger, and in her own words she describes why: “It is important to me to see the paths I take and the places where I spend time as I would when I am drawing. When I draw I observe exactly and select simultaneously. The construction of focal point, point of view and the viewer’s standpoint are important criteria for me when I observe the searching and scanning movement of the eye during perception. I try not to portray strategies of orientation that I am familiar with, rather I pursue other relationships with my pen and follow these up on the surface. Space-oriented drawing and reduction through the degree of abstraction are important in order to establish an individual cartography for each moment of perception. Lines curcumscribe and divide, they mark a point of change, draw a boundary, they open or close. There are areas where things and relationships aren’t as we think; where boundaries and characteristics become blurred. Drawing/mark making means laying tracks, paving the way for the observing eye.”
╳ To view more of Ms Ergenzinger’s work please follow the link below.
╳ www.nodegree.de
