Harvester for Dreams of Wildness

Yokohama, Japan, 2009

 

This work was made for a green zone in Yokohama – in a lush forest surrounding the Yokohama zoo. The beautiful lush wildness of the little forest was amplified by the smells and calls of the wonderful animals held captive in the zoo beyond.

 

The installation was composed of two "dream traps" each about 2.2metres high by 1.5 metres wide when extended, made of laser cut plywood suspended from stainless steel rings and a steel cable held taut between trees. Running above the dream traps, a system of funnels interconnected with tubing attracted and condensed the animal dreams that floated over the high stone walls of the zoo and woven through the trees of the forest at night. The traps were activated by audience interactions through pressing up and down on a suspended beam running just above the ground beneath the dream traps. The pumping motion on this beam made the traps move in and out, up and down, so that the distilled essence of the zoo animals’ dreams of wildness could be transferred into the psyche of the audience member.