Rakugaki
Interactive multimedia installation, 2001

Rakugaki is an interactive drawing installation with sound.
It brings back your childhood memories or simply lets you have fun.

When you play the trumpet or the drum, a line appears. It starts to bend and wiggle, to transform into animals, a fish, etc.
When you play the bells, figures start to revolve happily!
When you play the shaker, the cube turns freely! It’s like a snow shaker.

This project is situated on the borderland of the analogue and the digital. The essence of this artwork is combining visual effects and the real-time interactive nature of computer technology, to see how the latter can interpret sound and transform it into a line, which it then animates. The ultimate aim of this work is to be exhibited in public areas such as subways, atriums and shops where there is a large open space and a large number of people can experience the work.

This idea came from a poetic image, of a sound transforming into a line. The image of this work brings back sweet memories of one’s past and inspires one’s imagination. With its warmth, beauty and simplicity, a line being drawn encourages the audience to participate, by observing how a line transforms and interacting with the work.
When a person plays a toy trumpet, a line will appear. The line starts to bend and wiggle in accordance with the sound of the trumpet, a snake charmed by the flute. The lines start to transform into animals, insects, birds and human forms. They start to move and then disappear.

For this work, I used pictorial representation. Drawing (lines) is an analogue process. It is a direct form of expression and has a primal quality. I included a device, which transforms a sound created by a musical instrument into a drawing. Musical instruments are also analogue constructions and one does not need to deal with any complexity.

The digital part, the image of a huge cube, can be projected on a wall, ceiling or floor. The idea of the cube's visual effect came from an image of turning a picture book. Each surface of the cube becomes a screen and the audience can turn it with the sound of a shaker. The surface will have the image of a land on it, a sky, a seascape and a line drawn. The sound of the toy trumpet will make it wiggle like a spring and transform into the most suitable animal for the chosen environment, which will then move.

My aim has been to create a piece of work that is enjoyed by people of all ages, one which can be simply seen, felt and experienced, without giving it much thought.