The Fourth Plinth...

[KB7DQH]

Follows is yet another article about this interesting piece of "interactive artwork"... I say "yet another" as this item has popped up on the web almost daily for the last 3 weeks or so ;D

Here goes...http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/reviews/fourth-plinth-st-martininthefields-london-2070588.html

Quite surprise nobody else on the forum has picked up on this :o

Eric
KB7DQH

[David Pinnegar]

Hi!

Thanks for pointing us in this direction!

For those who have not followed the link, it's about a proposal to make a cash dispenser in the shape of a pipe organ. That should get good publicity for the organ as an instrument! Ironic however as organs are more usually seen as cash eaters than dispensers - I wonder if there has ever been an organ built for venal reasons which has ever earned back its investment?

As an aside, it really would be great if people placing links to external news sources might possibly be able to give a very brief synopsis about what the link is about. Apart from anything else, this will make the posting more relevant as far as search engines are concerned and therefore increase the probability that a posting will be picked up by the search engines, multiplying the efforts of all who contribute here in the cause of trying to breed enthusiasm for the organ.

Best wishes

David P

[revtonynewnham]

Hi

I agree David - please add a brief note of what links are about.  I don't always have a lot of time, and as a result tend not to bother with ,inks unless I know that the subject is of interest (not only on this forum!). 

Every Blessing

Tony

[KB7DQH]

Although the  ATM-controlled organ isn't going to be displayed in London, it will be displayed in an art gallery in Venice, Italy...

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/15/arts/design/allora-calzadilla-gloria-venice-biennale.html

The notion of pushing the limits is heard over and over from Ms. Allora, who, with Guillermo Calzadilla, her partner in life and work, make up Allora & Calzadilla, an artist team in Puerto Rico. The two were frantically putting the finishing touches on this performance along with the five other new projects that will be incorporated into "Gloria," an exhibition that will occupy the American pavilion at this summer's Venice Biennale. The artists, who are hardly household names, will represent the United States in a prestigious international arena, like Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg and Ed Ruscha before them.

To perform the pieces they have gathered a cast that includes Dave Durante, a champion in all-around gymnastics; Dan O'Brien, the 1996 Olympic gold medalist in the decathlon; the gymnast Chellsie Memmel, a silver medalist at the 2008 Bejing Games; and Ms. Wilhelmi, among others. There will be a 52-ton military tank turned upside down and topped with a treadmill and an Olympic runner; a classical-style bronze sculpture lying inside an open tanning bed; a custom-made pipe organ incorporating a fully functioning A.T.M.; and a 21-minute video that depicts the island of Vieques in Puerto Rico, which until 2003 was the site of bombing experiments and war games for the Navy.

In their hugely ambitious exhibition, the artists have assembled objects and expertise from all parts of the globe. The tank was shipped from Manchester, England, in two flatbed trucks that are arriving in Venice by boat; the organ is coming from Bonn, Germany. The bronze statue was made in a foundry in Berkeley, Calif.; the tanning bed is being sent from Indianapolis; the A.T.M. is being shipped from Milan, but the computer program that runs it was conceived in Paris; the airline seats were made in Los Angeles.

But perhaps that work will be upstaged by the giant custom-designed pipe organ that incorporates the A.T.M. Visitors will be able to check their balance or get cash, and for every transaction different musical sounds will be heard emanating from the organ. "Nothing will ever be repeated," Mr. Calzadilla said. "Sometimes the music will be atonal or cinematic, or like a horror movie or a gospel."

And when the Biennale is over, then what? "Hopefully," Ms. Allora said, "all these pieces will go on to have a life in other places."

It will be interesting to see what becomes of the organ...

Eric
KB7DQH

The article links to a slideshow, which includes a photograph of the ATM/organ in the organ builder's shop...

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2011/05/15/arts/design/20110515_Allora_ss-5.html

[KB7DQH]

More on the ATM/Organ...

http://www.finextra.com/news/Fullstory.aspx?newsitemid=22612

and

http://www.npr.org/2011/06/02/136897424/a-tank-an-organ-and-smart-power-at-the-venice-biennale

[KB7DQH]

And another...http://www.bizmology.com/2011/06/03/musical-atm-makes-a-statement-at-venice-art-exhibition/

Eric
KB7DQH

[KB7DQH]

Apparently  the ATM installed within this pipe organ is now the "most popular in Italy"... based on the value of cash withdrawn...

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/06/03/venice-biennale-money-talks-make-that-sings/

Let's please dispense with the clichés about art and money and instead take a look at getting hold of cash in Venice. There is only one A.T.M. machine in the whole of the Giardini, the gardens at the tip of the city that is home to the national pavilions.  It's in a space of its own at the back of the American pavilion.


But this is no run-of-the-mill A.T.M.  The brainchild of the artist duo Allora & Calzadilla, it is a pipe organ with an A.T.M. embedded in its belly that is computer-programmed to play a tune when a person puts in their pin number. Even when returning customers use it, no two tunes are alike.

Naturally it has become quite the hot spot, with lines forming outside the pavilion all day. Theories have even been circulating that the bigger someone's balance, the more elaborate and longer the composition, something officials at the pavilion hotly deny.

During the first three days of the Biennale's V.I.P. preview earlier this week, more than 100,000 euros were withdrawn from the machine.  That amount, Lisa Freiman, commissioner of the pavilion said, is three or four times the normal activity of an A.T.M. in Italy, according to BNL, the bank that operates it.

When it gets low on cash, gun-toting guards can be seen coming to replenish it.

Eric
KB7DQH