The multimedia art project myMatrix by media artist Wolf Nkole Helzle is a vast cosmos of images of a special kind. Designed as a participatory project involving the local population, thousands of images of a landscape, a city or a region move across a large area indoors or outdoors. These are images that the artist captures with the local population during photographic walks. In the projection, the images condense into three dimensions, then explode again, contract or pause at an image and fly on again in a constantly random order.
Sound artist Mirja Wellmann focuses on the acoustic dimension of the same place. During listening tours with the local population to acoustically interesting places, she makes notes of the sounds of a place, which she then combines with field recordings to compose and record an audio piece in the style of concrete poetry. Musicians who join the project on a project-by-project basis use their sounds to evoke different moods in the images.
A sample-Matrix in 3D is now online
The implementation of a project
First, data is collected. This data consists of thousands of images of a landscape, a city, a region and, depending on the project, sounds, speech and music, which are carefully compiled by the participating artists.
The public is invited to participate in the data collection by accompanying the artists on their photographic and listening explorations.
Once all the data is available, it is fed into a specially developed database and the projection is started, for example, on a large wall indoors or outdoors.
Outdoors, this could be a building façade, a pedestrian underpass or a screen at a festival.
Indoors, it could be a museum or other public building. The images can be projected onto surfaces using a video projector or viewed on large screens.
The images fed into the system are layered in three dimensions and move through space according to an invisible dramaturgy. Visitors can step right into the middle of this matrix, this visual and acoustic adventure. And in doing so, they encounter their region, their landscape, and perceive it anew from thousands of different angles.
The projection can also be controlled manually, for example by touching an image on a touchscreen.
How is a myMatrix project created?
The client and artist meet to assess the environmental conditions and discuss the possibilities for execution based on these.
• Which landscape, city or region is the target of the project?
• What are the distinctive features of the area?
• What is the idea behind the project?
• In what time frame should the project be implemented?
• How long should the projection last and where should it be projected?
• Is a temporary performance planned, or will the database be updated repeatedly over a longer period of time?
• Which population groups can participate in data collection (children, adults, disabled persons, etc.)?
• Which artists will be invited to participate in the project?
• What kind of music is conceivable (choir, instrumental, classical, etc.)?
• What technical equipment is available?
• What financial resources are available?
The artists
Media artist Wolf Nkole Helzle works primarily with photography, video, installations and performances. Many of his works are participatory in nature: spectators, guests, passers-by and visitors become part of the artistic process.
Helzle is responsible for developing the overall concept of myMatrix and the software – in collaboration with students from the technical universities of Munich and Nuremberg – and for collecting the images. He also usually directs the projects.
Sound artist Mirja Wellmann is known for her extraordinary acoustic perception of places and is often referred to as a "professional listener".
She creates audio logs of selected locations by listening intently for long periods of time and identifying the characteristic sounds of a place. In participatory projects with the population, such as the listening tour, sound notes are created, which the artist rocesses into audio pieces in a kind of concrete poetry.
http://www.mirja-wellmann.de/biografie/
Musicians and possibly other artists are usually requested on site depending on the project, as the images react sensitively to a wide variety of music.
Selection of previous myMatrix projects
JavaOne, San Francisco
During the international developer conference in San Francisco, images were collected from participants and historical footage from past conferences was shown.
InterFace AG, Munic
For the 30th anniversary, photos of employees and from the company's history were fed into the system and displayed on numerous monitors..
Town of Luxembourg
Together with a community of photographers, Wolf Helzle spent several days exploring the city. myMatrix was shown in the centre of Luxembourg on the Place d'Arm during Whitsun week, accompanied by a variety of musical performances.
University of Birmingham - Digital Humanities HUB, UK
Photographs also taken with a group of photographers, as in Luxembourg.
Technical University - College of Art and Design, Beijing
With 40 students, Wolf Nkole Helzle filled the matrix over a period of 14 days.
INTERIM-Kulturhandlungen, Münsingen
Wolf Helzle's collection of images of the Swabian Alb was supplemented by images from the public and from the municipal archives.
Fraunhofer Institut IIS, Erlangen
Images from the company's history accompany the anniversary celebrations in a myMatrix projection.
75 years of Wolf Nkole Helzle
A biographical work featuring 16,000 images from the artist's life.
Excerpts from this presentation were used in the video.
The development partnership
The collaboration with the IF-Lab of InterFace AG, Unterhaching near Munich - with support from the Technical University of Munich, Department of computer science - and media artist Wolf Nkole Helzle is a server-based Web application.
