Gallery: This Shimmering Sculpture Is Actually a Giant Google Chrome Tab in the Sky
Photos by Ema Peter, Courtesy Studio Echelman01SPARKS8
“Unnumbered Sparks” was created by Janet Echelman and Aaron Koblin to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the TED conference.
Photos by Ema Peter, Courtesy Studio Echelman02SPARKS5
Photos by Ema Peter, Courtesy Studio Echelman03SPARKS7
Echelman’s an artist known for canopying city streets with colorful, quivering mesh sculptures.
Photos by Ema Peter, Courtesy Studio Echelman04SPARKS6
Koblin heads up Google Creative Lab, the data art outfit responsible for Arcade Fire’s pioneering web videos, among other interactive works.
Photos by Ema Peter, Courtesy Studio Echelman05SPARKS4
The rope here is several times stronger than steel.
Photos by Ema Peter, Courtesy Studio Echelman06SPARKS3
Passersby could draw on the net at nighttime with their smartphones.
Photos by Ema Peter, Courtesy Studio Echelman07SPARKS2
“When you look at the sculpture, you’re looking at a web browser. The lighting on the sculpture is actually a single fullscreen Google Chrome window over 10 million pixels in size.”
Photos by Ema Peter, Courtesy Studio Echelman08SPARKS1
A slightly nerdier take, but a gigantic tab in the sky has a strange poetry of its own.
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