Wolfmachine
2021
Wolfmachine, 2020-22.
5 portable hemispherical robotic lasers 532nm.
Since 2020, the ArteCódigo team has developed a bio-electronic work for wolves and non-human ecosystems (Wolfmachine) designed by André Sier to be installed in the landscape. The premiere of the work took place at the Iberian Wolf Recovery Center (CRLI) of Grupo Lobo.
Wolfmachine is a bio-electronic work composed of electronic mini-laser lighthouses spread across the landscape that sing in sync with visual patterns of historical data on the evolution of the lupus population in Portugal during the 20th century, through the rhythmic emission of green laser light beams to the sky.
For about 20 minutes, data from a century of wolf presence in Portuguese geography serve as a numerical source for the patterns of luminous pulses from lasers emitted to the sky. Each decade of the 20th century, at each laser point in the landscape, emits the number of wolves observed and recorded in Portugal, over 2 minutes of spatialized visual rhythms.
In addition to a light show that visualizes the near extinction of the apex predator, essential for the preservation of forest biodiversity, Wolfmachine is a bio-electronic work by wolves for wolves that simultaneously works as a visual protection barrier in the landscape for the animals, and as a metaphor for the meeting of wolves in packs that come together to chant almost shamanic chants, telecommunicating with the unknown, evoking protective omens.
For Grupo Lobo and its Iberian Wolf Recovery Center, Wolfmachine was temporarily installed outside the fences where wolves reside, aligned with wolf data points in 20th century Portugal, and was executed at twilight and even before the aurora, filming the result of the piece through fixed cameras and a drone.
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