wejetset magazine
Name of the text: Places to see: binary waves on Paris' St. Denis
Date: 27.10.2008
Publisher: Taj Reid

featured project: binary waves

''From the creative studios of LAb[au] we present another inspiring installation. binary waves, located on Paris' St. Denis River (RER D Station), reminds us of a lighted EQ bouncing to the rhythms of an energetic groove. Billed as the Urban Cybernetic installation, it's based on measuring infrastructural - people, cars and trains - against communicational - magnetic fields produced by mobile phones and radios. We like how binary waves interacts with its surroundings and adds a very modern aesthetic to the area. As they state, "The relation between the installation and the urban activity happens in real time and sets each person as an element of the installation, as a centre of the public realm."

More on binary waves: The installation binary waves is constituted by a network of 32 rotating and luminous panels of 3 meter-high and 60 centimetres wide, placed every 3 meters to form a kinetic wall. The panels rotate around their vertical axis, and have a black reflective surface on one side, the other being plain mat white. Their rotation is controlled by microprocessors, allowing to determine precisely the rotation speed and angle, while their networking allows to synchronise the movement of the 32 panels. The microprocessors are connected to infrared sensors, capturing the surrounding infrastructural flows, defining the frequency and amplitude of the rotation. According to this set up, each impulse is transmitted from one panel to the other, describing visual waves running from one side of the installation to the other, and then bouncing back while progressively loosing oscillation. All these principles relate the 'micro-events' happening in the area to a unified play of light, colours and sounds directly derived from the rhythm of the city flows.