the boxPoem was completed as a mid-term project for a phyiscal computing class at ITP. depending on which way the box is tilted as you hold it in your hand, a different verse of a poem is heard through small speakers embedded inside the object. below is an excerpt from the journal i kept during the course, describing the design process in detail.
foundation
| this
midterm project is a modification of an idea i had at the beginning
of the semester. i wanted to explore ways in which poetry can be
rendered as a physical object. experimentation with visual poetry
is centuries old, of particular interest to me is Hrabanus Marus'
De
adoratione crucis ab opifice, i am fascinated by the author's
use of a two-dimensional matrix to structure his thoughts. the twentieth
century was bursting with a vibrant array of concrete poets investigating
the image/text dialogue. poetry in three dimensions, however, still
seems to be an area in need of good preliminary investigations.
i suppose i shouldn't be shocked, after all our grammar is quite
linear and two-dimensional. yet humans have an amazing capacity
to move through space, to localize sounds in their environment -
why not bring this ability into our understanding of words? can
space be semantically meaningful? |
object
| i decided to fuse a physical object and a poem. using several voice record/playback devices and a tilt switch, i made an object that would play a different verse of my poem depending on how it was held. though i originally wanted to use a ball (actually, a set of at least three balls), the design troubles were legion. for instance, how would i insert my circuitry into a ball? if i surgically cut into a rubber ball, taping my wires and speakers to the sides, would i be able to close up the incision? what an incredible pain it would be to change a battery, it would have to be a limited-time-only project. boo. let's say i found a hard plastic ball, that came apart in the middle, like an Easter egg. easy access to batteries, nice firm surface that wouldn't harm my speakers when rolled about. how would i balance the weight of the circuitry within the ball? a ball that only rolls to one side does not fit my cognitive schema of a ball. nope, a lopsided ball just couldn't cut it. i decided upon a cube for the housing of my circuit poem. a perfect, simple, right-angled box. |
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circuitry
| this project used the following items:
the
first problem to solve was determining how to replace the "play"
button of the voice chip with a switch. when the "play"
button is depressed, a small metal disc inside the button momentarily
closes a circuit, and the sound is heard. flipping the circuit board
over, i traced the two interlocking current paths undernearth the
button - one side went to the battery connection's ground, the other
to a resistor. |
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i stripped away the black plastic sheath of the ground wire and soldered a new wire in that place, which would eventually be connected to one side of my switch. in the picture above, this is the blue wire leading away from the area labeled "ground". |
since there was not enough exposed wire from R3 on the back of the circuit board, i flipped it over and soldered a new wire to R3 from the front. had to be really careful not to melt the circuit board or drip solder in an inappropriate place - these are cheap little suckers! |
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after each of the three circuit boards were prepared, i soldered my six wires to a tilt switch. the process was straightforward, but required a certain amount of patience and precision. now i just had to place the medusa-circuitry into some nice housing. |
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a ssessment
| though the project is relatively simple from a techincal standpoint, i believe the conceptual basis is rich. the most difficult part was certainly crafting the poem - i'm the type that can agonize over a single word. i accomplished what i set out to do, yet several improvement could be made:
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