PDF OF THE COMPLETE PROJECT PROPOSAL FOR DOWNLOAD

Description:

"Poseidons Pull" is a collaborative water-current controlled drawing with Poseidon, the God of Water, of Poseidon himself. The initial drawing will be drawn from a custom made astrological constellation of Poseidon, in the waters surrounding the Greek islands. The constellation has star-points, or anchor points, that will match the constellation exactly. be tracked virtually using a GPS tracking system and GPS transmitters. GPS transmitters will be dropped or "poured" out of hydria cermaic jars, at specific locations into the seas surrounding Greece, and their movement will be tracked over the period of 6 hours as the currents pull them into different directions. An animation will be created starting at the drop or "pour" location, and ending at the retrieval location. The relational lines between each point, that is the lines constructing the constellation image, will naturally morph, or animate, as the individual star-points or anchor-points of the constellation drift, therefore creating a new constellation image. We are in the process of programming a software titled the Myth Prediction Analysis Automator. This software will do two primary things within a Google Image Search. It will automatically create a Google Image Search, will add constellation points to each image searched, and will match that constellation for similarity or likeness to that of the drifting star-points/anchor-points from the "pour" location to the retrieval location of the Poseidon constellation. In the end, one image for every frame of the animation will be placed in a sequence generating a slide show, from which a mythical prediction (from Poseidon) will be interpretted/inferred/concluded/surmised.






The Collaborative Team:

This digital real-time environmental drawing will be implemented by a team of collaborators with a Processing, Arduino, a GPS navigation system, individual Cellular Locative Transmitter Devices, a boat, raw material from each of the islands to create ceramic water jars called Hydrai (in ancient Greece). The five collaborators, or Poseidon's titan mermen, presently consist of: Max Kazemzadeh (Assistant Professor of Art & Media Design at Gallaudet University in Washington, DC), Reza Sefavi (Assistant Professor of Art at Washington State University in Pullman, Washington), Adnan Naseem (Film Maker and Special Effects Specialist), Joe Hicks (Visiting Lecturer in Ceramics at both Gallaudet University and George Washington University).

Hydria Ceramic Water Jars:

These five mermen will drive a boat from island to island in Greece, physically drawing Poseidon's astrological constellation in the water, while digitally tracking the boats path using a GPS tracking system. When the mermen's boat arrives near the appropriate island (the one serving as an anchor-point/star in the Poseidon constellation drawing), their first task is to find clay or minerals from that island that can be used to sculpt a hydrai water jar. The mermen will dig a hole in the ground, add wood, making a kiln, and then will fire the hydria jar. The finished hydria jar will be used in a ritualistic manner, to pour the waterproof cellular transmitter into the water, maintaining a connected to the boat with a fishing wire. With the transmitter in the water, the mermen will turn off the boat and drift with each transmitter drop for 6 hours, while receiving data from the transmitter to be used for the drawing. Below you will see preliminary google earth images revealing the mineral/clay studiesd done in preparation for the onsite creation of the hydria ceramic jars. Each hydria jar will represent aspects of the Poseidon's Pull project with imagery cooked into the surface of each jar. The imagery represented on each hydria jar will represent images relating to the activities transpiring around the time of each particular drop/"pour" and retrieval.







The Constellation Analysis Software:

After the data is collected, as stated above, we will have a database of random images found on the web for which we will create constellations. As the drift occurs, the configuration of Poseidon's drifting constellation will continuously seek similar constellation layouts and display those images over time as Poseidon's constellation drifts, changes, and evolves. Using this image sequence, we hope to find messages that Poseidon is trying to send us.
Also, in the installation, images can be taken of people in the room, and automatically given a constellation. Sequences can be made using multiple constellations to create other mythical predictions using Google Image comparative matching searches.