Amy Franceschini
From CT4CT: Creative Tools for Critical Times
Amy Franceschini is an artist, educator and founder of Futurefarmers (1995) and Free-Soil (2002). She teaches Media Theory and Practice courses at Stanford University and the San Francisco Art Institute.
According to Green Museum:
Artist, educator and award winning web designer Amy Franceschini applies her multimedia talents to the multidisciplinary effects of globalization and its many environmental consequences. Her approach often combines strong graphics, interactive physical and website environments, with a commitment to "long-term engagements with the public".
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Projects
Gardening Superfund Sites
Free Soil's Gardening Superfund Sites (2005) is an artistic research project designed to raise public awareness about superfund sites.
According to Future Farmer:
Gardending Superfund Sites is an art project which fosters discourse around the issues of nature preservation, industry, and activism. By providing information and facilitating activities with students and community groups we are making a call to action to high tech industries to take responsibility for their actions. This is a global issue that needs to be addressed locally!
An important component of the project includes the use of Soil Sampling Shoes which covertly collect soil samples from superfund sites in an effort to obtain information about the history and current status of the toxic clean up.
According to Worldchanging:
The shoes gather information in the form of soil information that can be pure evidence. This soil presented in the form of a sculpture becomes suspended evidence. The shoes become charged objects in the sense that the glass vials filled with soil become a representation of the memory of each site. A record of the waste produced in the making of computer memory in the early 1980s.
See also:
- Free Soil Bus Tour
- Future Farmer: Gardening Superfund Sites
- Worldchanging: Sampling from Superfund Sites
Photosynthesis Robot
Amy Franceschini's Photosynthesis Robot (2003) is a prototype of a perpetual motion device propelled by phototropism - the movement of plants towards the direction of the sun.
According to Franceschini:
This piece was made at a time where I was a bit disheartened by "New Media" works. Rather than a "Why the Future Doesn't Need Us" robot take over, I proposed a nature take over - or a way of working with nature rather than trying to mimic it or replace it. The larger question this points to is the perceived separation between humans and nature. This piece is about that paradox. It fits into a larger thematic in my work in terms of a concern about our role as humans within the greater body of the nature we are part of. Much of my work is about balance. In the case of Photosynthesis Robot, it is dependent on several variables in order to propel itself forward. Who will provide water, lighting conditions and space for it to move about and do its business? In this case chasing after SUV's capturing CO2 emissions. Go [little] robot, go!
See also:
