1. Introduction

Chance, the core of Frozen Poetry, has been a research theme in art since the beginning of the 20th century. Dadaism was an artistic movement that emerged in Europe in the beginning of the First World War. It was marked by the exploration of chance in several works and in the so-called “abstract poetry”. Hans Richter (1993, p.64), an artist who was part of that movement, reports that “‘chance’ became our trademark. We followed the direction it pointed, as if it were a compass”. In this experiment, chance is an essential part of the process of construction of the meaning of the work, through interaction. In this process, the observer ceases to be passive and becomes also an active author of the work, participating in the construction of the poem. Here the image of the romantic poet inspired by nature and equipped with unique sensitivity is replaced by the raw chance of physical objects, uncontrollable by nature. The emotional heat of romantic poetry is replaced by the coldness of ice cubes that are used to fix syllables randomly, as in a mechanic process, but controlled by natural forces. The death of the author is thus privileged over that centralizing image highlighted by Barthes (2004).

During the process, several improvements were made in the interaction design of the work. However, because it is fundamentally an organic project – that deals with the physical phenomena of freezing and melting – chance remains determinant. It is impossible to know exactly when the contact between the ice and the projected surface will “freeze” the syllables. Chance corroborates the authorial questioning in this work; not even the public can completely control the results.

In the final project, an invoice printer was added as an ironic element of the process. From it the “poems” can be detached and taken by their author/public. The printed poem leaves for the public a little of that creative process of poetic construction with ice, and the visitor can takes his/her poem home in an ironic reference to the author/poet/artist that needs a physical record that documents its creation.

2. Creative process

This project is the result of an experiment with new forms of interaction as a creative language. During experiments of interaction with physical objects such as movement, heat, wind (blowing), emerged the idea of creating an installation where the public could not only interact, but also create meanings through the work, while chance did not allow a total control of the meanings.

The first idea that emerged was that of creating an interface that could be controlled through temperature. Physically, the experiment is equipped with a metal plate, similar to a white board, installed on a wall containing a temperature sensor LM35 installed on its back. This analogical temperature sensor, connected to the microcontroller Arduino Nano (Figure 1), is responsible for the detection of temperature. The information regarding the temperature is transmitted to a personal computer – a Dell Vostro 1400 laptop. The computer used the free software Processing to generate graphic computing, which resulted in a series of pre-selected random words. The words change each second and present on their top left side the current temperature. A test video for the concept was created from this experiment on www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDEUoGCaAcs.

Another free software used in this experiment was Arduino. In addition to these pieces of software, the project also includes free hardware, with all the open specifications for the production of the plate and the assembly of the components. The tests were made with Arduino nano, the compact version of Arduino, which has Atmel Atmega 168 as a microcontroller. The experiment started from the concept of tangible interfaces and graspables, seeking to use common physical objects as devices of entrance and exit. Photo 1 demonstrates the visual response and the interaction of the observer through a glass with ice.

3. Final Project

During the experiment, we observed that improvements could be implemented in a final product. The initial idea was to have an end in the interactive process that could be understood by the observer; thus, after 3 minutes of inactivity, the installation would generate a song from the words and their temperatures. However, this idea was abandoned for the possibility of continuous printing of lines in a dot matrix printer. Each new line formed in the projection would generate a new line physically printed.

For the final project, we planned a support, below the metal plate, similar to those used to keep whiteboard erasers. However, there would be no erasers in the art work, but ice cubes at the point of melting. On the floor there would be water spatters from the defrosting. We expect that the observer interacts with the work, holding an ice cube and touching it to a syllable which, when “frozen”, forms a word with the other syllables. The words vary from one to five syllables.

During the project, we observed one problem: the plate remains cold even after the ice is withdrawn. To solve the problem of the plate cooling, the “freezing” temperature ceased to be absolute and became relative, i.e. one degree below is enough for the syllable to “freeze”. Figure 2 shows the final interactive flow, where we added a new variable, the increase of the speed of syllable exchange according to the temperature.

Another problem found was the fact that the reading of the temperature is slow; some seconds are necessary for the temperature to increase after the ice cube is withdrawn from the plate. The solution found was to add a photoresistor, a sensor that allows the reading of incident light. This way, when ice was rubbed on the board the light reading was altered in consequence of the shadow generated by the spectator’s arm. With this new sensor it was possible to give immediate feedback to the interagent. Figure 3 illustrates the final assembly.

Facing the comings and goings of the project, the need for experimentation is clear when it comes to new forms of interaction between public and art work. We still know little about how this interaction will happen in an exhibition environment.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Koji Pereira: specialist in Interaction Design and with a degree in Fine Arts from UFMG. Had exhibitions and urban interventions in 2002 and 2003. Later got interested in digital art, where he could unite his concepts of interaction design and art by participating in projects of performances and installations. In 2009 he received the prize Aesthetic Interactions from Funarte.

André Veloso: has a degree in Computing Science from Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais. He develops software in the field if digital interaction, especially systems that use multi-touch interfaces, tangible controls and interactive systems, new forms of Man-Machine interaction and in the application of these paradigms in musical and visual interactive systems. He carried out academic research in the areas of Digital Processing of Images and Computational Vision. In 2009, he received the prize Aesthetic Interactions from Funarte.

Marcos Paulo Machado: has a degree in Social Communication from Centro Universitário de Belo Horizonte – Uni-BH (2007) and was a post-graduate student in Interaction Design at PUC Minas. He is currently a freelancer in the field of design with a focus on the user and information architecture, and is also focused on applications for the web environment. He provides services for companies such as Anima Educação, Plan B Comunicação Digital, and Intra Comunicação. He worked as an interface designer in the field of system development of Centro Universitário de Belo Horizonte.