An interactive miniature installation that invites people to take a peek at normal people’s daily life under quarantine.
Jingyao Shao, Viola He
Description
Light Up 2020 is an interactive miniature installation that uses light and projection to explore moments in mundane lives during the COVID-19 pandemic. Seeing the silhouette of 4 people living in a neighboring building, the audience is given a flashlight to shine through their windows and reveal the residents in full color, eavesdropping on their conversations, interactions, and observing snippets of their day-to-day life.
We were inspired by our lockdown experiences in populated cities hard-hit by the pandemic — how our daily routines changed as we spent the majority of our days home alone, and how our relationships with our neighbors evolved. We read stories from Wuhan, Milan, New York City and beyond, about people coping with the lockdown through music, art, self-care, cheering for essential workers, and loving balcony exchanges with their neighbors. We hope to create a narrative, present in the form of an interactive installation utilizing paper model, light, and projection, to capture that spirit. We wrote and devised 4 stories with the help of some of our friends at ITP. Some characters come from our minds, some inspired by their own stories, brought to life through their improvisation acting. In this generic 3-story apartment building, you get to take a look at unique personalities, sending care to their loved ones, enjoying songs and movements, despite the unusual circumstances.
There’s also something inherently interesting about watching and being watched that comes with urban living where we can peak at people’s lives through their windows. The interaction of spotlighting through a window is, in turn, a discussion of our voyeuristic curiosity as human beings. Playing around with the scale, this miniature installation also offers an unprecedented intimate storytelling experience.