Technology Tide Pools [1998]
The installation consists of two kiddie pools wrapped in dried spanish moss and cedar chips with video projected from overhead on the water's surface. The videos show a collage of found footage of underwater and outer-space environments -- images that we often take to be perceivable without intervening technologies.
Technology Tide Pools represents a kind of microcosm of technologically-mediated perceptions. The installation is sensorially engaging, with the 'natural' smells of cedar and spanish moss complementing the visual projections and multi-channel audio. With the videos projected on the pool surfaces, the viewer is allowed to experience the imagery less as a framed video than as a 'natural' component of the pools.
This immersive environment considers the way that technologies affect the way we perceive our natural environments (from the telescopes that allow us to see outer space to the manufacturing technologies that allow us to buy dried spanish moss as a representation of the outdoors).