I am working towards creating a piece called Window Vision, which will act as a window covering that  highlights the changes in the outside environment by shifting its components in response to light and dark.

Previous weeks I had been struggling with creating something that would effectively work in a modular pattern as the basis of my structure.

from there, I started looking at structural patterns in nature and seeing the similarities.

but what if i flipped it? instead of thinking of mobilizing solid pieces of the pattern, what about the joint structure in between?

however this also catapulted me on a track to start considering weaving techniques as a structure.  i began looking to the work of sheila hicks, annie albers and gunta stolzl as inspiration.

gunta stolzl

annie albers

in conjunction to exploring the visual concept of the piece, i was also examining the inherent properties of vision and light.  the “bandwidth of consciousness” article reminded me of how our eyes take in so much information but yet how little our consciousness registers.   from here i stepped into the world of neuroscience to form a link between the piece as a reflection on how we as humans will perceive this “window to the outside world” as well as the mechanics behind our vision.

Much of this is enabled through the structural properties of your retina which is the part of your eye that responds to light.   within the retina there are two photoreceptor cell types: rods and cones.  rods are the cells that are the most sensitive to changes in light and dark, shape and movement and only have one light-sensitive pigment.  however because of this, they are not extremely sensitive to color.  in a dim environment however, we mainly use our rods to see (quickly moving from a light to dark area however usually takes our rods 7-10 min. to take over).  cones however, work only in bright light, and are sensitive to one of three colors (RGB).  these cones translate signals to our brain which than perceives it as a color. incidentally, color blindness occurs when the retina is lacking in cones or are irregular.

the challenge now of course is to translate all of this information and to funnel it into a piece that adequately addresses a cellular/modular structural pattern, something that incorporates sensitivity to changes in light, and differentiating functions in terms of light and color.

Photocells will sense the changing light levels of the area outside your window and initialize the servo motors mounted to the frame which are connected to the “cones” that will activate and push the “rods” aside with increasing amounts of light.

iterations