Malte Wagenfeld and Jane Burry

With our deepening awareness of human impact on global climate and the implications this holds, there has been a collective shift in the way we conceptualise air and atmosphere. We no longer think of it as part of the vast empty expanse of outer space; the earth’s surface ceases to define the periphery of our planet. The conceptual and perceptual planetary boundary has expanded, air and atmosphere are an indivisible part of our globe and our lived life, and how we deal with it has consequences.

Dynamics of Air taps into a growing international body of creative and scientific investigation into our relationship with, and experience of, air, atmosphere and climate, which reflects this conceptual shift from the material, solid and fixed towards the immaterial, fluid, transient and temporal; from cerebral aesthetic judgement to phenomenological experience; from a desire for certainty to an embracing of complexity.

The exhibition developed out of a mutual fascination for the dynamic qualities of air and atmosphere, which we have both been exploring in different ways for over ten years.

My captivation with the matter and poetics of air lies in a lifelong curiosity about environmental forces and the kinetic, dynamic, temporal and experiential. Following a lengthy investigation into air phenomena, how we experience climate and how we might design with air, I am now investigating and designing experiential ‘air’ environments and, integral to this work, my intention is to stimulate people to think about interior air environments more openly – to let go of the concept of ‘comfort’ and embrace the richly diverse and ever changing qualities of air: atmosphere and experience; and to inspire a move away from energy intensive and often unhealthy hermetically sealed, mechanically conditioned air. This requires innovating more desirable alternatives, but it also requires a shift in expectation and mind-set, away from the highly predictable, solid-state and neutral towards the dynamic, sensorially rich and temporally variable.

Malte Wagenfeld

For me it is about how the architectural design process can bring about much needed changes to both the phenomenal experience of the atmospheric interior that Malte has alluded to and the urgently needed revolution in the way we service and consume energy, and contribute heat from buildings. A principal role of architecture is to modulate

the atmosphere. As buildings have gotten fatter, and expectations of temperature and constancy have changed, the atmosphere within has become more mechanically and numerically controlled, and less part of the overall architectural conception and design. Design technologies give us the opportunity to move beyond just flexibly modelling what can be seen in architecture to being able to link the behaviour of air and what you feel to our design models. Air is a very complex phenomenon to model. To do this meaningfully, architects and designers have to work with aerospace and mechanical engineers, computer scientists, and others to develop ways to simulate environments and design with them both virtually and physically.

Jane Burry

The exhibition is a live research lab where these ideas and concerns are staged in ways that enable visitors to experience and explore, and to be sensorially and intellectually stimulated. Rather than an end in itself, the exhibition is a site of investigation in which participants audition ideas, curate experiences of air and atmosphere, observe and discover, as a critical part of an ongoing conversation.

The work presented involves a broad transdisciplinary group of artists, designers, scientists, and theorists who were asked to develop new original works in response to the curatorial ideas. Collectively the works expose the manifest qualities and concepts of air as experienced through the senses: visually, through movement, through the skin, breath and the lungs, sound, smell and intellectually.

The six distinct gallery spaces allowed us to curate the work thematically as an assemblage of experiences with different levels of sensory through to intellectual engagement.

CITA’s almost weightless but geometrically complex Inflated Restraint, which explores air as generative structure, was juxtaposed into the heavy-walled neo-classical stairwell of the gallery foyer.

Moving into the lofty Gallery 1 and adjacent Gallery 4 spaces, the visitor is immersed in the poetics of breath, wind and air-movement, rendered as a visual experience though such phenomena are normally imperceptible to the human eye. Edith Kollath’s nothing will ever be the same makes visual the chaotic shifting form of the air through a free falling, translucent cloth that assumes a unique shape on each descent in response to air movement.

Cameron Robbins’ wind drawings lyrically plot the capriciousness of wind while in Little Wonder’s 10 Kinds of Fog air moves through different perforated membranes becoming animated as an array of delicate mist-like aerial nymphs. Breath, rhythmic but never repeating, is evoked through the sound of Edith Kollath’s addressable volume while her liminal passage confronts the visitor with the opportunity to share a breath, passed through water, with a stranger; bringing into consciousness the intimate sharing of air between lungs that occurs constantly in shared space and, on a larger scale, the notion of atmosphere being globally shared. In Chris Cottrell’s Sounding the Air, a helium balloon balanced by a repurposed FM receiver, traces the gentle gallery winds to broadcast quotes about air and ambient recordings of air. Natasha Johns-Messenger and Leslie Eastman’s Airlightform, a large spinning centreless disc, generates a rhythmic optical mirage, flickering between the material and non-material, positive and negative space, becoming a form of quasi-thing (Hermann Schmitz) while pulsating warm breath-like parcels of air from its tubular opening. In Fluidifying… exploding body, event in the making, Helen Dilkes presents a work capturing the open-ended moment of an explosion in both form and sound.

Complementing these explorations are two architectural projects presented as video scenarios. Philippe Rahm’s Interior Gulf Stream is a proposition for an architecture that circulates thermodynamic phenomena throughout an interior with the spaces and functions programed according to the desired thermal living conditions. In Particle Sections, Eric Ruiz-Geli dematerialises the notion of architecture altogether. Breaking it down into nanoparticles, he studies the environmental forces on a building as nanoparticles to re-materialise an architecture that dynamically responds and interacts with its environment.

In Galleries 2 and 3, two experiential environments allow visitors to dwell and explore the nuanced shifts in microclimates. The skin and its extension into the lungs are engaged through breathing in the humid, salty and fragrant air of Breathe Earth Collective’s Aerosol, a rethinking of a traditional vernacular ‘machine’ for creating health-giving air, which was developed in salt mining regions in Austria, Germany and Central Europe.

In conceiving Outside_In Malte Wagenfeld consulted with Transsolar to create dual interacting atmospheres—the cool moist air of a forest gorge and the hot dry experience of the beach—within a single space. These two atmospheres morph at the edges, impacting on each other to create a spectrum of transient microclimates. As visitors slowly move through the space, they experience subtle sensory shifts in atmosphere.

The projects in Gallery 5 explore the science of air. In Bio-inspired Sensing for Micro Flight Vehicles Professor Simon Watkins and his team demonstrate how their research on how birds navigate turbulent air is informing the design of more stable microlight vehicles that can, like birds, sense turbulent events before they impact on their flight. Scientific photographer Phred Peterson uses the optics of Schlieren photography in A Visible Wind to capture the nano temporality of air phenomena while Daniel Prohasky’s Pulsometer studies the limits of our physical perception of air movement. Architect Mehrnoush Latifi uses an array of sensors and augmented reality to visualise in real time how the air is modulated by her prototype for a ceramic tiled architectural skin.

Interspersed between these is a series of counterpoints. Friedrich von Borrie’s playful but poignant work signals the implications of interfering with weather patterns, such as seeding of clouds and raises questions of our global responsibility for climate and the ownership of clouds. This is further explored through his alter ego Mikael Mikael and in his whimsical White Clouds of Sugar in which a dancer (Deanne Butterworth) distributes cotton candy clouds throughout the gallery spaces according to a loosely composed score. Jane Burry’s Air presents an evocative series of literary quotes tracing our collective contemplation about air and atmosphere from the late Enlightenment with Luke Howard’s naming of clouds and the poetry of Wordsworth, which have shaped our sensory imagination.

Dynamics of Air brings together a broad community of practice. Artists, designers and scientists from many different disciplines explore shared concerns: how we relate to, live with and understand air, climate and atmosphere; how we can use this knowledge as a force for our creative practice; and how we can shape our lived environment to harness these forces. Our intention is to provoke a vibrant dialogue around these concerns between participants and visitors, and to inspire further collaborations, new insights and, we hope, much needed changes in our appetite for atmosphere.

Edith Kollath, Germany, addressable volume, 2018, five channel video installation, duration: 0:04:45, courtesy of the artist and the Goethe-Institut 18

Above and opposite page: Edith Kollath, Germany, liminal passage, 2018, glass, distilled water, mouthpieces, courtesy of the artist and the Goethe-Institut

Right: wandering breath, 2018 eucalyptus breath, glass object, steel rods, courtesy of the artist and the Goethe-Institut

Natasha Johns-Messenger and Leslie Eastman, Australia, Airlightform, 2018, steel, aluminium, three-phrase motor and variable speed drive, programmed LED lighting, cardboard tubing, paint, courtesy of the artists 23

Cameron Robbins, Australia, Sonic Wind Section Instrumental, 2014, digital video (stills), duration: 0:05:30. courtesy of the artist and the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA), Hobart 25

Cameron Robbins, Australia, (L-R) 16 - 23 December 2013, Snake and Egg, 7 Days 2013; 21 February - 4 March 2014, Crocodile, 11 Days 2014; 3-12 December 2013, Gusty and Changeable, 9 Days 2013; 18 - 28 October 2013, Two Symmetrical Winds, 10 Days 2013; all works: pigment ink on paper, courtesy of the artist and the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA), Hobart 26

Chris Cottrell, Australia, Sounding the Air, 2018, latex balloon, helium, electronics, FM transmission, duration: 0:35:20 looped, courtesy of the artist

Screen left: Enric Ruiz-Geli, Spain, Expo Pavilion, 2017, digital video, duration: 0:00:29, courtesy of the artist, Cloud9 Architects and Instituto Cervantes Screen middle: Philippe Rahm Architects, France & Switzerland, Interior Gulf Stream, 2009, digital video, duration: 0:13:01, courtesy of Philippe Rahm Architects and A_FRAN Screen right: Cameron Robbins, Australia Sonic Wind Section Instrumental, 2014, digital video (stills), duration: 0:05:30. courtesy of the artist and the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA), Hobart

Top: Enric Ruiz-Geli, Spain, Expo Pavilion, 2017, digital video, duration: 0:00:29, courtesy of the artist, Cloud9 Architects and Instituto Cervantes Middle: Enric Ruiz-Geli, Particle Sections, 2011, digital video, duration: 0:00:50, courtesy of the artist, Cloud9 Architects and Instituto Cervantes Bottom: Philippe Rahm Architects, France & Switzerland, Interior Gulf Stream, 2009, digital video, duration: 0:13:01, courtesy of Philippe Rahm Architects and A_FRAN

Helen Dilkes, Australia, Fluidifying… exploding body, event in the making, 2018, iridescent foil, acrylic, 925 silver, audio, 44 x 44 x 38 cm, courtesy of the artist 33

Mikael Mikael, Germany, White Clouds of Sugar, 2018, digital prints, digital video documentation of performance, courtesy of the artist and the Goethe-Institut 34

Mikael Mikael, Germany, White Clouds of Sugar, 2018, performed by Deanne Butterworth, documentation videography by Taylor Bennie-Faull 35

Little Wonder (Gyungju Chyon & John Stanislav Sadar), South Korea & Canada, Ten Kinds of Fog, 2018, acrylic, wood, textiles, electronics, foggers, fans, water, courtesy of the artists 36

Breathe Earth Collective, Austria, Aerosol, 2018, timber, water, pumps, fans, Murray River pink salt, melaleuca bush, courtesy of the artists, Austrian Trade Commission, Sydney and the Murray River Salt Company 38

Above: Friedrich von Borries, Germany, UN MAHAC, 2018, paper, staff identification card, manuals, hat, t-shirt, stamp, courtesy of the artist and the Goethe-Institut Opposite: Jane Burry with Swinburne Bureau, Australia, Air, 2018, digital print on 200gsm matte uncoated paper, six posters: 118.9 x 84.1 cm each, courtesy of the artist and Swinburne University of Technology 40

Malte Wagenfeld & Transsolar (Thomas Auer), Australia & Germany, Outside_In, 2018, high pressure ultrafine foggers, IR heat lamps, LED lighting, micro-processors, timber, board, courtesy of the artists and the Goethe-Institut and RMIT School of Design SRC 42

Mehrnoush Latifi, Australia, Making the Invisible Visible, 2017-2018, ceramic tiles, sensors, electronics, HoloLens, Mixed Reality app (Mixed8), courtesy of the artist 44

Daniel Prohasky, Australia, Pulsometer, 2018, robotic 3D print, laser cut acrylic, mechanical components, electronics, sensors, pulsatile airflow, courtesy of the artist 45

Daniel Prohasky, Australia, Mini Interactive Wind Tunnel, 2018, 3D print, CNC milled timber, projection mapping, virtual wind, courtesy of the artist 46

Top: Phred Petersen, Australia, A Visible Wind, 2018 Schlieren photography: digital video (still) Duration: 0:04:59 Courtesy of the artist Middle, bottom: Simon Watkins, Australia, Turbulence Modelling, 2015 digital video (still) Duration: 0:01:47 Courtesy of the artist 47