Space Messengers
Space Messengers is a mixed reality installation and youth workshop that is part of the STEMarts International youth exchange program in partnership with the U.S Embassy of Portugal and the U.S. Consulate General of Guadalajara. This virtual collaboration connects middle/high school classrooms in New Mexico, USA with classrooms in Lisbon, Portugal and Guadalajara, Mexico through a shared sci-art installation that will tour around the world.
This interactive installation allows us to generate and project text messages collected from participating students and the live audience. Students co-write messages communicating the science they learned from scientists in the workshop. Students share their thoughts and wishes for a sustainable interplanetary future. The messages are projected along with silhouettes and earth/space imagery from students. The audience can visit this website page during the event for a live stream of the projection and to see all the students messages scrolling on their device. The festival audience can also send their own messages through the website and they will appear in the scroll and on the building in real time. Through this mixed reality experience participants on site or at home where ever they are become part of the installation in real time, radiating their space messages out to the world!
Creative Team
The creative team for Space Messengers started in 2013 by Agnes Chavez as the Creative Director, Markus Dorninger/OMAi team as lead projection artists and Dr. Steven Goldfarb, particle physicist from CERN under the title of Projecting Particles Collective. Since then it has grown to include the members you see in the Creative Team. Go there to read their bios and learn about all the artists and scientists that are collaborating on the Space Messengers project.
skills applied
- Astrophysics
- Particle Physics
- Space Science
- Projection Mapping
- Digital Creation Tools
MESSAGE FROM THE ARTIST
"We are living in a time that urgently needs you, our youth leaders, to forge a new path as informed citizens on this planet but also as part of our newly discovered interplanetary universe! By participating in the Space Messengers project you will learn about the latest discoveries in space science, and why our relationship to nature and each other is an important part of protecting biodiversity. You will help create this interactive installation as part of an international team of students, artists and scientists. The final installation will travel to festivals delivering your space messages out to the world." Agnes Chavez
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The New Tagtool
The Fabric of the Cosmos: What is Space?
CERN in 3 minutes
The Origins we Share: Havana Biennial
The Tagtool Crew at Arts Electronica Festival 2017 -
The Night is our Canvas
Mobile Storytelling
(x)trees algorithm
Origination Point Installation: Harwood MuseumTaos
Lakota Cosmology Meets Particle Physics: Converging Worldviews -
(I=)UNIVERSE: An intercultural sci-art exploration of the universe
The final installation will be projected on to the buildings and large scale walls as part of festivals around the world. The projection mapping is designed and led by Markus Dorninger and his team, OMAi using the TouchDesigner and his Tagtool app for live painting. Interactive silhouettes are projected on to the walls allowing for the audience to trigger video and images collected from the Space Messengers youth workshop along with their messages to create a universe of thoughts and wishes for a sustainable future.
Students participating in the Space Messengers workshops use the 'Space Board', our custom data sharing platform created in collaboration with artist, Roy MacDonald, that allows students to co-write their space messages with their peers in partner countries during the workshops. These messages are automatically integrated into the code that is projected on to the courtyard walls in the final installation as generative messages appearing in animated sequences. The audience can also interact by sending their own SMS or WhatsApp messages from their devices or from our website. The messages appear in real time in the projection and scrolling on the website.
Sound engineer, David Novak and his students from Lusofona University in Lisbon, Portugal created an immersive soundscape using the NASA sounds from space and nature sounds.
Space Messengers is projected live on a building or wall at the festival and live streamed into our new STEMarts Metaverse, a virtual reality platform that will host interactive virtual reality experiences such as the Global VR Youth Day. In this event, participating schools and community organizations join a private VR space where students from around the world interact with the installation and socialize with each other, in conjunction with the live event. As Space Messengers travels to festivals around the world we create a 3D model from each venue allowing the audience to experience current and past installations through an interactive VR experience.
The SpaceMessengers.com website hosts the livestream of the projection so that anyone can see the scrolling workshop space messages as well as the real time messages being sent. Participants can send their own space messages sharing their thoughts and wishes for a sustainable interplanetary future.
