Muto (Scape): A Panorama of Animation Specimens

the target, killing some 80,000 people, injuring as many more, and condemning innumerable others to death by radiation poisoning. The blast leveled nearly 5 square miles of the city. Three days later, the B-29 Bock’s Car, captained by Major Charles Sweeny, departed Tinian forJapan. Its primary target was Kokura, in the Northeastern part of Kyushu, with Nagasaki as the alternate , to be determined by weather conditions as the aircraft neared the area. It, too, would score a direct hit, with results nearly as devastating as that of the Hiroshima bomb. Fifty years later, America is saddled with its own nuclear heritage. Sixty-five million gallons of deadly wastes-which accumulated at the Hanford Reservation when the bomb was bei-ng developed -sit, still ignored, stored in some 177 rusting steel tanks leaking toxic waste into the soil and the water table. There is still no plan for disposal of radioactive waste, and minimal preparations exist in the event of a nuclear disaster. Yet, business and government both pursue aggressive policies of nuclear development while humanity lives within the shadow of the bomb. Note 1. Eternity Ignored is a collaboration between Ann Rosenthal and Stephen Moore (whowas a resident of the Territory of Guam from 1991-1992). We were collaboratorsin a largergroup called UNARM between 1982 and 1984. CJNARMproducedfour inFig . 3. Stephen Moore andAnn Rosenthal, photo image of Atomic Bomb Pit No. 1 at Tinian, N. Mariaua Island,from the installationE t e r n i t y Zgnored , installedat WonderfulWorld of Art, Seattle,Washington ,1993. Eternity Ignoredis an ongoing collaborativework intended to coincide with the fiitiethanniversary of the detonationof the f i i t atomic bomb. (Photo:S. Moore) stallations that examined societal attitudes towards the nuclear threatand providedinformation about the arms race. One of these projects, installed in the Federal Building in Los Angeles, was censored. Eternity Ignored, installedatWonderful World of Art, Seattle,Washington,February 1993, is an extension of that work. PERCEPTION: FMTFORWARD I11 Isabelle Chemin and Guido Hiibner, Das Synthetische Mischgewebe, 30, rue Theodore Ducos, 33000, Bordeaux, France. Perception: Fast Forward III [11, a multimedia work about the interaction between men and machines, was created in 1992 in the Centre CIEJ, a space for media education in Barcelona, Spain. It included three installations and a closing performance (Color Plate B No. 1). The installations were composed of audio and video equipment, as well as sensors and electronic controllers that allowed temporal and spatial modifications of the sound, video, computer imagesand light. The accompanyingperformance included both a live performer and an industrial robot: IRB 2000 from ABB Industria S.A. One of the installationsincluded three video monitors in a construction of transparent acrylic tubes. A system of relays and sensors linked the imagesfrom three videotape recorders to these monitors. Each tape was interactively created with one of the three composite video colors (red, green, blue). By coming in contact with sensors, spectators induced variations and altered the images. The other installations were similar in concept but varied in materials and spatial organization. The accompanying performance utilized (among other things) related visual elements, a performer (visibleonly as a black shadow or as a shining body with stroboscope eyes), programmed robot movements and bursts of electrifying noises. Perception:Fast Forward IZIwas meant to create an experience of multidimensional presence and perception rather than an overload of information. Technology of different degrees of sophistication was used in a non-exploitative manner in order to enable the viewer to observe, sense and feel from different but simultaneous viewpoints. Note 1. Perception: Fast Forward IIIwas created by the group of artists called Das Synthetische Mischgewebe -artistic direction: Isabelle Chemin and Guido Htibner; electrical engineering: Carlos Jovellar;robot programming:Ramon Tic0 i F a d ; image processing: Carlas Llorach. The work was made possible by grants from DRAC, Bordeaux, France,and “laCaixa”,Barcelona,Spain.Time and equipment were providedby the University of Bordeaux 11, Michel Guatterie, ABB lndustrisa S.A., FBS Seguridad, S6hngen Gmbh and Carlas Llorach,Centre CIM, UPC-ICT. MUTO(SCAPE): A PANORAMA OF ANIMATION SPECIMENS Christopher Burnett, Kansas City Art Institute, 4415 Warwick Blvd., Kansas City, MO 64111, U.S.A. Suddenly, everywhere we look, shapeshifters , changelings and...