Urballoon Creates a “Digital Bonfire” in NYC Tonight

Urballoon is back. This one-day interactive outdoor art installation will start today as part of the Conflux festival.

The Urballoon is a large helium balloon with a video projector and a wireless laptop that projects user-generated content onto public spaces. It floats above in parks or plazas and displays the video onto the ground, encouraging people to gather around a “digital bonfire.”

For tonight’s event, taking place at Tompkin’s Square Park from 7:30-10pm, people will be asked to address the theme “What is New York?” in words or images. Submitted responses will be shown in real time from a video projector suspended from the Urballoon. This year, Urballoon has  optimized the urballoon.com site for mobile devices so people can participate on site through their phones. People are already taking part…

The Urballoon has been appearing at events since 2003. According to creator Carlos J. Gomez de Llarena:

“the project was born as a concept of “parallel space”: an experience of a built environment so intertwined with electronic mediation that it can’t be reproduced without technology. Many of these ideas are referenced in films like Blade Runner or by authors such as William J. Mitchell. The work of the artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer has also created a precedent for Internet-mediated urban spectacle as art. This project seeks to present our online communication back onto the street as a reimagined urban experience, stressing the role that the city has as an interface for daily life.”

Urballoon

Conflux Festival