onnai

Exhibitions:
2011 Floating Land Festival, Boreen Point AUS

oceans of air began development in New Plymouth, Taranaki during the SCANZ 2011: Eco sapiens creative residency.  More information on the development can be found here.

In June 2011 the project was presented during the Floating Land Festival at Boreen Point which is located outside of Noosa in Queensland, Australia.  The focal venue is Boreen Point at Lake Cootharaba in the UNESCO-listed biosphere of Noosa, with satellite locations at Coolum and Cooroy on the Sunshine Coast.

A 1.5 meter diameter balloon was designed and hand made in an effort to be able to reuse and repair the balloon during the event. Aerial video was employed as a means to create additional ways of visualising and experiencing the surrounding environment.

Workshops were facilitated to encourage community engagement. Numerous performances with the balloon were enacted, with heights of up to 500 meters reached. The calculation of back trajectories continued in line with the methodology developed in New Plymouth.

Artist and scientist Ramon Guardans traces pollutants and their effect on local and global populations, health and environments and examines the relevance of different ways of life in understanding exposure. He has been involved for 20 years in international action on atmospheric and marine pollution including the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) and the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program (AMAP). Ramon is joined by roboticist Kirsty Boyle and environmental engineer and media artist Tega Brain in conducting experiments within the atmospheric and aquatic environments of Floating Land.

Generously supported by P.M Schultes, experimode.eu.  Behind the scenes info on how the balloon was made is here.