Constellations is a dynamic and immersive artwork animated by flowing patterns and algorithmic formations of light and shadow. It is an iconic sculpture that merges digital craft and fabrication with data visualizations of abstract phenomena found in nature at a variety of scales. Constellations creates a theater-in-the-round that acts like a portal into an invisible world of dynamic visual poetry inspired by ideas of science, art and technology.
Date: 2020 (ribbon cutting April 2023)
Location: University of West Florida(UWF), Pensacola, Florida
Lead Artists: Jason Kelly Johnson & Nataly Gattegno (Futureforms)
Artist Team: Jason Kelly Johnson, Nataly Gattegno with Brian McKinney, Carlos Sabogal, Natalie Abbott; Assistants: Cristina Bejarano Cobo, Chris Leo, Valerie Tse, Joel Frank, Emily Saunders.
Structural Engineer: Endrestudio (Paul Endres, Dave Campbell)
Fabrication Team: Futureforms (San Francisco, CA), N.J. McCutchen, Inc. (Stockton, CA), Jose Zelaya (Certified Welder) Brothers Welding, Seaport Stainless (Richmond, CA) Advanced Electropolishing (Milpitas, CA), Craftsman Concrete (Pensacola, FL), Southwest Cranes and Rigging (Pensacola, FL), Rudd and Son Welding (Pensacola, FL), Bill Smith Electric, Inc. (Pensacola, FL), Color Kinetics LED (Signify).
This sculpture was made possible with the support of the University of West Florida's Askew Institute of Multidisciplinary Studies and the Department of Art and Design
Awards & Recognition: 2020 CODAawards Top 100; 2020 Architizer A+Awards Finalist; Architizer Featured Project.
Press: Culture of Curators
Tags: #constellationsuwf
MORE DETAILS:
Constellations is located between the Center for Fine and Preforming Arts and the Hal Marcus College of Science and Engineering at the University of West Florida in Pensacola Florida. It anchors the landscape between the STEM disciplines on campus and creates an open ended framework for dialogue between the arts and the sciences. Part performance space and part data visualization device, Constellations creates the gathering space for the dialogue of different disciplines and information.
The structure forms a 30’ x 25’ x 16’ theater in the round – a place to gather, collect and experience. Constructed out of stainless steel, Constellations is made up of a series of galvanized steel structural columns, stainless steel elliptical beams and lattices. Suspended from the lattices are a series of stainless steel trays that hold Phillips Color Kinetic LEDs, controlled by a Pharos LED controller.
Inspired by early studies and translations of animal locomotion using chronophotography and planetary motion simulations, Constellations uses geometry, light and shadow to create a meditative internal space that at night becomes a playful illuminated sculpture displaying constellations of motion. Never the same - always in flux.
Constellations merges art and science, technology and experience, data and art. The theater-in-the-round brings together people from divergent disciplines, to observe patterns of data, discuss and collaborate. Whether a musician seeing the rhythm of a score, a dancer studying a choreography, a computer scientist observing data patterns, or a meteorologist gazing at images of clouds; Constellations brings together otherwise siloed disciplines and people through the merge of art and technology.
