A Parallel Image
an installation by Gebhard Sengmüller, in collaboration with Franz Büchinger, supported by Fels-Multiprint
“A Parallel Image” is an electronic camera obscura. This media-archaeological, interactive sculpture is based on the fictive assumption that the currently still valid principle of electronically transmitting moving images, namely by breaking them down into single images and image lines, was never discovered. The result is an apparatus that attempts a highly elaborate parallel transmission of every single pixel from sender to receiver. This is only possible by connecting camera and monitor using about 2,500 cables. Unlike conventional electronic image transmission procedures, “A Parallel Image” is technologically completely transparent, conveying to the viewer a correspondence between real world and transmission that can be sensually experienced.
[pictures from the promotional brochure (images)]
[A Parallel Image Graphic Generator installation (images)]
[A Parallel Image Miniature Version installation (images)]
[A Parallel Image - Ampere, Ohm, Volta C-prints (images)]
[promotional video (video)]
[promotional brochure (pdf)]
[catalog text (pdf)]
[Graphic Generator text (pdf)]
"A Parallel Image Graphic Generator" (2010) installation views
In 2009, I finished the first installment of my installation series "A Parallel Image", the camera - screen unit. Now I am further advancing my original proposal. The second installment is the Graphic Generator: this installation follows a similar principle. A grid of 13 x 15 switches on the sender side can depict a simple light bulb graphic on the receiver side. This installation can be operated intuitively by viewers. In the exhibition space one sees a switchboard - monitor unit: two one meter by one meter printed circuit boards made of epoxy are hung from the ceiling about two meters apart from one another. The switchboard side is loaded with a grid of 13 x 15 switches. The circuit board defined as monitor is loaded with a grid of 13 x 15 large light bulbs in standard E27 sockets (220 Volt, 25 Watt each). Large quantities of insulated copper wire connect the two circuit boards. Additional wires lead to an external electricity supply. The techno-sculptural beauty of the installation is a side effect, so to speak, and inevitable.
Click on preview pics for screensize images (72 dpi).
Click on "printsize" for high resolution images for print use (up to 20x30 cm at 300 dpi).
All files are copyright © 2008 by Gebhard Sengmüller. Permission to publish is contingent upon proper published attribution to "A Parallel Image" and the subsequent receipt by Gebhard Sengmüller of a copy of the published material.
In the case of special requests or problems, please e-mail us at gebseng@gebseng.com