Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Construction Site Porn


under construction
Originally uploaded by backward square leg.
I remember reading a news article a few years ago about a major construction project in downtown Chicago. Someone (the construction company? the city?) erected bleachers near the site. While the motivation for this move is unclear, the reaction was astounding--all kinds of downtown people spent their lunch hours, cigarette breaks, etc. in the stands, watching the work go on. Sure, some were comparing cute butts, but I'd guess that most of them were eyeing the cranes, dirt movers, the displacement and creation of space.

What makes you drool at construction sites? Is it the improbable lifting and placing of giant objects? The speed of some stages and apparent snail pace of others? Part of it--for me at least--is the time I get to spend with the guts of something that eventually will be sheathed, its secrets hidden away. It's an opportunity to see how something is made, to un-take-for-granted the way it works. It involves me, even as an onlooker, in the process. I like it the same way sports fans like watching the pre-season draft. We were there before the record wins. We were there when it was built.

I was reminded of this pleasure last night, when I came home to a group of Second Life builders working in our living room. They were working on a build collaboratively, with one person's computer hooked up to a digital projector, so Second Life was about 4x6 ft on our wall. It was captivating. They were creating blocks, texturing and slicing them, moving them around, changing things on the fly. From their perspective as 3D artists, it's annoying that Second Life only allows you to build in-world; that is, you can't create something in another 3d application like Maya and import it (yet). They can't wait for that change to happen, but as a bystander, I hope it takes a little while--or, at least, that some people keep building real-time in Second Life. I'm not a 3D artist, but watching them work opens up my access to understanding how things are put together, and increases my interest in the final product. There's an energy and liveliness to the process that goes to sleep when it's all done. There's a reason that people love this video of Robbie Dingo building a guitar in SL. As you watch, you grasp some things, glimpse others. You see the possibilities. You start to dream.

So give me a painting in an art museum with a video of the artist creating that painting right next to it. Give me animations of poems being written. Give me animals in various stages of taxidermy. Give me a window into the often locked box of genius so I can play, too.

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