Cloudscapes

About This Project

How do we feel when a cloud rains over us? When the rain is virtual but sounds real? What if a cloud decides to rest in the city? Is thundering its’ way to attract passersby?

Cloudscapes is a responsive installation recreating a natural phenomenon through modular design, light and sound. We invite people into a world of virtual rain, thunder and lightning, proposing a synaesthetic experience. Through simulation we attempt to create a dialogue between urban space, technological media, natural phenomena and people’s perception; to look for the ‘invisible side’ of public experience. Cloudscapes lands temporarily over the city, inviting people to come together under its’ canopy to chat and play with the ripples of light and sound. When people pass under it, the cloud emits light resembling lightning and produces the sound of rain and thunder.

By creating this new, simulated cloud we attempt to question the concept of a cloud, while adding a virtual layer to the real object. A natural cloud is ‘natural’, as well as a cognitive construct. Hence we propose a fake cloud, yet a real object extending its’ presence from the physical to the digital space.

The project was originally commissioned by RGB Light Festival (Rome 2015), and has taken part in In/Visible Cities (Gorizia 2015), Live Artena! (Artena 2015), Attraversamenti Multipli (Rome 2016), Revisioni (Rome 2016) and Pomezia Light Festival (Pomezia 2017).

Projects leads: Artemis Papageorgiou & Gabriella Mastrangelo
Software development: Artemis Papageorgiou & Christos Koutsouradis
They talked about us on Reppublica TV