THIS SUMMER, I teamed up with my collaborator Kevin O’Neill to bring to life an interactive sculpture that had lived in a sketchbook of mine since 2010 – a giant dry-erase surface in the form of a 300 lb rotating globe.
Participants use magnetic dry-erase markers to draw in new nations, mountain ranges, and fantasy oceans. Suitable for “cartographers of the imagination” of all ages! In fact, people of almost any height can take part simultaneously, as the 36” diameter world illustrates the fact that there really is plenty of room for everyone on this sphere!
We enlisted the help of the Wicker Park Bucktown Chamber of Commerce to fund the project and Nick Berg at Ojo Customs headed up the steel fabrication. Check our their projects at http://www.ojocustoms.com. This is the same shop that recently created the political sculpture Metro Gun Share Program:
I was inspired by the beautiful metallic seafoam-green of the Ellis bandsaw in Nick’s shop to give the project a vintage hammered aqua color palette.
We debuted the sculpture at Wicker Park Fest, and for the entire three-day street fest people flocked to the globe, drawing, writing, and doodling. Every hour, we’d dutifully wash down the orb and give the crowd a blank canvas again.
We even made a mini-globe for the dogs:
At night, the installation comes to life with LED lighting and can also become a dynamic projection-mapping surface!
Pen, Ink & Song 