Anna Frants – Tabletop Memories

Anna Frants, CYLAND MediaArtLab
Video installation, 2015
Old table lamps, nano projectors, video, motion sensors

Programming and robotics by Alexey Grachev

On its face, the installation of a table with desk lamps on it has no artistic value.  However, as it is often the case with this artist’s works, we should expect the unexpected.  The first surprise is that when we switch the lamps on, they pour out the sound and not just the light, and the second is that the light turns out to be moving pictures.  The tabletop comes alive with video-memories.  They seem to be countless – from a romantic poetry reading under the starry sky to a prosaic view of the rails seen through a gap between the cars of a moving train.  Each of us could identify with at least one such memory, but even if not, the tabletop memories will now become our own.  When we start interacting with this installation we expect to see some kind of lighting.  Instead, we get some kind of enlightening.  “Thanks for the memories…”