About, above: Day 2

Belmore Park, 9am


looking up and into the planetarium - you can see the stars!


curiosity got the better of them
Belmore Park, 11.20am


Belmore Park, 11am


Belmore Park, 11.01am


matching shorts
Belmore Park, 9am


kids just ran straight towards it, and got it immediately... they didn't need to read no tag...
Belmore Park, 11.30am


Belmore Park, 11.30am


Camera obscuras of the leafy canopy above, seen from inside the planetarium
Belmore Park, 3.30pm

Day 2 was so very different from Day 1... I had made this planetarium just over double the size of the ones I installed on Day 1, and the scale of this one turned out to be an ideal balance between largesse and seclusion.

The crowds passing through Belmore Park (which is next to Central Station in Sydney, so quite a busy thoroughfare) were much more inclined to segue from the path and interact with this planetarium, it seemed... lots of people and kids running over to it, ducking under and staying in there for ages. We even had a line-up a couple of times...

This planetarium was an experience that people could easily share with each other, which is what I had hoped would happen. Being more than twice as wide as the Day 1 planetariums, this one fitted about 3 adults or 5 kids comfortably inside at once... which made for some great moments... lots of little kids being lifted up to see the stars, then put back down, then crying to be lifted up again and see more stars...

Although I'm new at object-street-art (if that's what it is...?...), it is already clear to me that there is a fine line between an object which invites both curiosity and interaction, and an object that invites curiosity only... the Day 1 planetariums were, for the most part, on the 'curiosity only' side of that line... people did occasionally duck inside to investigate, but it wasn't an immediate reaction. Clearly, small weird cardboard things that hang from trees are there to be photographed infront of. However, slightly larger weird cardboard things that hang from trees are there to be fully investigated, explored, enjoyed and shared.

So it's the excitement of one's first fridge-sized box all over again. Only the box is impregnated with the night sky. And it's hanging from a tree.

Stacks of photos from the day here.
Thanks to Kat Spat and her homeboy Kurt for adding to the documentation. Thanks to Nick for being a legend. Thanks to Jack for his truck. Thanks to Sydney for being the wonderfully curious and twisted town that it is.

About, above: Day 1

Cardboard Planetarium, Macquarie Place, 7am


Macquarie Place, 9.20am


Hyde Park, 10.30am


Inside the Planetarium, 10.35am


Macquarie Place, 10.50am


Hyde Park, 8.15am

About, above: Locations

fliers for the event - made from scraps of genuine planetariums!

About, above: Part 1
solar-powered cardboard planetariums.
Friday 22nd - Saturday 23rd February, 2008

Viewing welcome at the following locations:

Friday 22nd onwards, starting at sunrise:
Hyde Park (nr Park St)
Macquarie Place (nr Customs House)

Saturay 23rd onwards, starting at sunrise:
Belmore Park (nr Central Station)


Three cardboard planetariums installed throughout the Sydney CBD , rain, hail or shine. You are welcome to duck inside, and to stand for a moment (or as long as you like) inside a solar-powered simulation of the night sky. Full project description.


The planetariums are both delicate and temporary. Being installed, as they are, in public spaces, it is hard to say how they will fare and how long they will last. If you cannot find the planetarium that you have come to visit, it is possible that it has been re-purposed, or transplanted by someone... try visiting one of the other planetariums on the map.


Enjoy! Comments and feedback very welcome.


View Larger Map

INVITE to About, above: Part 1

Cardboard planetarium - first outing.

Please be advised that on Friday 22nd + Saturday 23rd February, 2008, there will be three Cardboard Planetariums installed throughout the Sydney CBD, rain, hail or shine. You are very much invited. Details of exact locations will be advised on this website on Thursday 21st Feb.

The splendor of the night sky has been a source of wonder, discovery and agitation for our species throughout human history. The observation of the heavens has defined religions, revolutionized scientific thought, guided navigators, and inspired countless mythologies. It has been said that 'they who cannot see the night sky, cannot see...'

In most urban environments, and cities in particular, light pollution renders the night sky down to a few of the brightest stars and planets, obscuring the majority of what has been so essential to our species' development. Perhaps it doesn't matter. Perhaps the stimulus of stargazing is not essential to a happy life. But just in case...

The Cardboard Planetariums will be found throughout the city, hanging in space, rotating lazily around their central hanging axis. You are welcome to duck inside, and to stand for a moment (or as long as you like) inside a solar-powered simulation of the night sky.

These cardboard universes, created with pinholes, contain a starchart accurate to 12 Midnight on Friday 22nd Feb, 2008. A solar-powered simulation of what is hidden, about and above, on a nightly basis.

About, above is a project in two parts, created by Kirsten Bradley during her time as Artist-in-Residence at Firstdraft Gallery, Sydney. Part 1 is the installation and documentation of Cardboard Planetariums throughout the Sydney CBD in mid-February 2008. Part 2 is an installation at First Draft Gallery in April, 2008.

About, above looks at pattern recognition and simulation, how we view 'nature', and what constitutes 'the natural' at this point in western thought. In a world out of balance, About, above also touches on points of Geocentricism, and asks how, as an urbanised culture, have we chosen to see as we do, for all this time.



This project has been made possible by Firstdraft Gallery through their Emerging Artist-in-residence program, and by EXPERIMENTA through their Media Art Mentorship program.

Firstdraft is supported by NSW Ministry for the Arts and the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body. EXPERIMENTA 's Media Art Mentorship project has been assisted by the Australian Government’s Young and Emerging Artists Initiative through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body. EXPERIMENTA gratefully acknowledges the assistance of CraftSouth to the EXPERIMENTA Media Art Mentorship Program.

LEO COYTE

LEO COYTE

Here are some more images of various source material. All is going well in the studio, I have completed most of the paintings and I am getting ready to start building a few structures/objects. Only a few weeks left now, I'll put some images of the actual work up closer to opening night.

ouchy cardboard arm

my first two small cardboard spheres... hard-won little cardboard worlds that they are...

I have now two small planetariums mostly finished, after much, much, much cutting of cardboard circles, and the makings of a third planetarium, which will be double in size.

As sore as my arm currently is, I must say there is no substitute for hard labour to familiarize oneself with the particulars of creation. I could now make 2v geodesic domes (that's the name of the particular geodesic structures I've been making) in my sleep, with my sore hand tied behind my back. Which is just as well, cause until you get your head around the construction of geodesic structures, they're really confusing.

Thank crikey for a couple of essential online resources - particularly this fab 'how to make a cardboard dome for your classroom' page, and this excellent dome calculator, which helped me get all the lengths right.

Next innings, it's all about mapping accurate starmaps onto the domes. Which will be sweet confusion all over again, but at least i dont have to cut out anymore cardboard circles.

Planetarium library

Reading list of all things helpful when trying to come to terms with object-making, geocentricism, the psychological role of nature in our history, and the aesthetics of rare experience...

Nature Design: From Inspiration to Innovation
by Barry Bergdoll (Contributor), Dario Gamboni (Contributor), Philip Ursprung (Contributor), Museum für Gestaltung Zürich (Editor), Angeli Sachs (Editor)
One of the *most useful* catalogs of natural patterning's influences on design that I've come across - lots of art nouveau examples as well.

Forests: The Shadow of Civilization
by Robert Pogue Harrison
Some really good thoughts on early Christianity's relationship to the concept and actuality of the forest and the open night sky of the plains.

Landscape And Memory
by Simon SchamaA bit of a classic in the genre of 'landscape, and you'. Seriously interesting.

A Field Guide to Getting Lost
by Rebecca SolnitI keep coming back to this text. It is full of anecdotes, deliciously told, which feed into my projects and jack into that part of my brain that is unconcerned with everyday life. Yum.

The Eye of the Lynx: Galileo, His Friends, and the Beginnings of Modern Natural History.
by David Freedburg
Very useful regarding the birth of heliocentric astronomy (versus the 'everything revolves around us' theory, as outlined here). The rest is probably good too, I just haven't read the rest yet...

Fiona Hall
by Julie Ewington
Yes well the woman is also my mentor currently, but this book is just exquisite - very good overview of her work, with all its intricacies and political implications.

pulling the sky past you...

a sea chart or stickchart of some of the Marshall Islands, showing the islands as the nodes (made of cowrie shells) , the swells as curved lines, and the currents as straight lines. This chart would have been used to teach navigation on shore

another stickchart of some of the Marshall Islands, this time made by a German dude as part of an exhibit... you can see that the cowries on the chart correspond (indeed, are actually linked with string) with a conventional map of the Marshall Islands on the wall behind... for the purposes of over-explanation...

detail of chart outlining the relationship with swell and islands, again as a navigational tool... if you're at a point where the swells are behaving like (f), you are therefore able to calculate your relative position to the island...

another stickchart, again showing islands as cowries, curved lines as island-refracted swells, and straight lines as currents

and another stickchart of the Marshalls... when I first saw these, I was a bit suspicious that they all had a boat outlined in them... me and my pea-sized brain... a boat is a refraction is a leaf is a swell-line...

Micronesian navigation is something I'm looking at because it seemed to be a very intricate and yet a very pliable form of navigation... a set of strategies for dealing with travel on highways constantly in flux - i.e. the ocean passages between the myriad of islands that is the Polynesian triangle...

The anecdote that nudged me in this direction was from my very wonderful friend, Annemarie Kohn, who mentioned to me the Micronesian navigational concept of a navigator or traveler remaining stationary in their canoe while 'pulling the sky past you', when traveling at sea. Apart from being an overwhelmingly romantic moment of magical realism, this concept really got to me.

It turns out that the Etak or Hatag system only employs this stationary/contingent system of navigation as a device, as a way of thinking about distance when traveling from one island to another... you, the navigator of the boat, are stationary in the universe, and by having intrinsic knowledge of the ocean, currents and placement of the stars and islands which you have learnt since you were young, you can twist, turn and push the universe around and past you, until your destination island shows up.

However... still within this system; if you figure out that your boat has gone off course, the universe becomes stationary and you become the moving object, until such a time as you have regained a sense of where you are in the system... at which point, you become stationary again, and continue to pull the sky past you...

There are so many deliciously un-European aspects to Polynesian navigation that it is truly stunning... and it makes my brain purrrrrr.

In sort-of but not-really complete contrast, all this has made me remember a reference to a passage by Rebecca Solnit in her seminal book A field guide to getting lost:

Malcolm... brought up the Wintu in north-central California, who don't use the words 'left' and 'right' to describe their own bodies but use the cardinal directions. I was enraptured by this description of a language and behind it a cultural imagination in which the self only exists in reference to the rest of the world, no you without mountains, without sun, without sky. As Dorothy Lee wrote, "When the Wintu goes up the river, the hills are to the west, the river to the east; and a mosquito bites him on the west arm. When he returns, the hills are still to the west, but, when he scratches his mosquito bite, he scratches his east arm." ... In Wintu, its the world that's stable, yourself that's contingent, there's nothing apart from its surroundings.

I've gathered the links I've found on micronesian navigation here...

what's happening at the Marshall Islands these days... US missile testing

immutable

Moon in an eccentric orbit with epicycles - Andreas Cellarius (c. 1596-1650)... the orbits of the moon around the earth - rather convoluted to allow for the intricacies of sustaining geocentricism

The shift in perception from an earth-centered universe towards a universe where we, the earth, revolved around something else, is a somewhat hairy patch within astronomical history...

I'm still sorting it all out for myself, but the basics are as follows: until the early 1600's, it was accepted in Europe that the earth was the centre of the universe. All the planets (which the sun counted as one of), the moon and 'the rest of the stars' were all lodged within spheres of crystal, which rotated around the earth. The moon was wedged in the closest crystal sphere, followd by the planets in a slightly larger (and therefore, further away) crystal sphere, followed by all the rest of the stars, which were locked into a single third sphere which rotated around the whole lot.

Planetary orbits around the earth - Andreas Cellarius (c. 1596-1650)

The heavens were immutable and permanent, the rotation and motion of the stars regular and un-ceasing. For the heavens were perfect and unchangeable, as god had made them that way.

Until upstarts like Copernicus and Galileo came along and buggered everything up, by offering (and proving via observation) plausible alternatives to this system. And then in 1604 there was a supernova - (the death of a star - the star gets MUCH brighter for a couple of days and then phuts out completely) which added to the grief of the situation, because this particular star wasn't visible to the naked eye prior to going supernova, so all of a sudden there was this really bright star for three days, which then disappeared... and this didn't fit in with the bit about all things being immutable and unchanging, obviously...

A depiction of the Copernican system - Andreas Cellarius (c. 1596-1650)... an alternative, heliocentric model. It took a while to catch on.

The thing that's tickling me at the moment is the lengths to which pre-1600 astronomers had to go to make all the motions of the heavens fit in with the geocentric idea (which was pretty much everything)... and the resulting charts and maps... great stuff...

I often wonder if the position we've put ourselves in, as western society, doesn't seem to indicate that we still think everything revolves around us... however these days we don't need illustrated charts to prove ourselves as the centre of the universe.. we have so many other ways... and we certainly don't need the church to tell us that we are the reason for creation, now that we've got... well, the ability to satisfy our every want, i guess...

Which brings me back to the night sky. Within a city, in the middle bit, the heavens and the general universe at large could be mutable or immutable or whatever they damn well please... it wouldn't make a jot of difference - you can't see it anyway, and it's not of any concern to you. Which makes me wonder about ways of seeing, and the perception of the world beyond the tops of the skyscrapers.. is there anything there? Maybe not. Or maybe only when the Goodyear blimp goes past does a pocket of the sky temporarily exist... and then fall back in on itself and revert to a blankness, with no relevance or meaning to us...

Goldbach, C. F. (Christoph Friedrich), 1763-1811... I take it Christoph wasn't in the city when he sketched this one.

No that there's much to see in the sky above Sydney today... look up and you'll get a big fat raindrop in your eye... which, by the way, the very fabulous artist Joan Fontcuberta used as constellations onetime (raindrops, that is - with insects and dirt) in photographs of a windscreen...