BLINK 2022

“String Theory for Dummies”

For BLINK 2022 I wanted to create a piece which people could interact with directly, in the hopes of sparking some of the same adventurous creativity in other people that was sparked in me when I first began my art career. Yarn was rolled into balls and people were invited to toss the yarn around and make their own additions or edits to the piece.

Two signs were set up around the piece inviting people to interact, which read, “Please Touch the Art. Grab a ball of yarn and do as you please! There’s no right or wrong answer. Weave it, toss it, tie it, throw it, rip it, zip, unzip it, and adjust things to your own vision. Do you have an idea? Try it out!”

Different types of yarn were used each night:

Initial setup and day one used patterned UV-fluorescent colors
Day two used non UV-reactive colors
Day three used solid color UV-reactive colors
Day four, the day I wanted to add chaos, used only black yarn

The piece was located in Washington Park in downtown Cincinnati, at the epicenter of the event. Thousands of people visited the installation throughout the course of the weekend, and the “please touch the art” sign was taken very much to heart by the majority of attendees. What was mostly intended to be low-key interaction by a few visitors at a time quickly turned into something uncontrollable as there were dozens and even hundreds of people surrounding and interacting with the piece at any given time. Children were tangled, people were caught, and some children and adults even attempted to climb completely into the yarn despite “no climbing signs,” – all to varying levels of success. It became almost a rite of passage for many people to walk all the way through the yarn.

An interesting takeaway, I noticed that as the piece evolved it evolved mostly in the places where average height people could easily reach to touch and tie the yarn themselves. The vertical strands increased but the ceiling was where people were manipulating it, and crowding had some impact on that. My original design was meant to be something that could fit in any parking lot or empty space, and is on scale to be both large enough but also compact enough. However, after seeing the popularity of BLINK 2022 I’ll have to ensure the next version is larger in scale in almost every way.

I’ll probably also have a dedicated “children’s area” for the next interactive installation.

Press Coverage

How it started:

Initially, I simply left a bucket with yarn balls at the piece for people to self-serve. However, far too much yarn was brought into the piece too quickly and people were unable to adjust with the loose strands fast enough. As a result, I was forced to limit the available yarn balls to ensure the piece remained accessible and aesthetically pleasing.

I love the above video because it was taken at dusk, where there’s still some ambient light. Here, the effects of the UV fluorescence are bright and apparent while you can still see the yarn without light.

How it ended:

The piece was very popular, gathering large crowds throughout the weekend.

As I arrived in Washington Park to remove the piece on Monday, a high-school senior asked to take some pictures with the piece. The photographer later took a picture of me after I climbed into the yarn (at bottom of page). Photo by Rae Lani Photography

The piece was accessible to the maximum, and people with any amount of disability still were able to access and enjoy it during the weekend. Below are some pictures of a family with disabled son, and below it a man with a cane and a woman on a mobility scooter enjoy the piece at the same time.

Setup and Initial Renderings:

Setting up the lighting, hurrying against a storm

Removal:

The final form before removal. You can see the black yarn, which was added the last day, at the lowest reaches.

Above photo by Rae Lani Photography

With lighting designer Jamebo Corsini next to the uncompressed carcass of BLINK 2022

Fallen soldiers from the weekend. Hair ties, keys and more. Not pictured: at least three pairs of eyeglasses which were lost but not photographed because they were either cleaned up or recovered before Monday morning.