QWERTY
QWERTY explores keys not just as input device, but what those keys represent. From screaming online, to endlessly wondering through virtual worlds these keys are a reflection of our digital actions. They are something we interact with everyday and yet many forget how the simple press of a glowing key can have great impact on peoples lives. Keys bring us together when playing games online, and divide us when all caps yelling on social media. With this series I hope viewers will ponder their own actions taken behind a screen while taping tiny keys.
We Don’t Need Another Algorithm
Left and Right Shift Keys – 2022
This sculpture of a physical user interface, keys we tap everyday, highlights the data collected and used then to filter the information shown to users online. Each bend in the copper wire represents 500 points of data collected, revealing that Facebook and Google might have 54,000 bits of data they can use to shift and shape our perspectives. The LED’s colors shift, on the left from purple to blue, and on the right from purple to red to white, emphasizing how this data is often used to further polarize the users.
Scream
Caps Lock key – 2020
Scream is an oversized QWERTY caps lock key. Its active light is constantly rotating reflecting the downward spiral of all caps yelling on social media. Its title is both a reflection of how many feel safe to yell and spew insults from behind the safety of a keyboard, as well as a reference to The Scream by Edvard Munch. I draw from popular culture’s view that his paining symbolizes anxiety, a feeling felt by many when confronted by an all caps message found in our email or Facebook wall.
Endlessly Running
WASD keys – 2020
Endlessly Running is a set of oversized WASD qwerty keys that are an overt nod to those used for gaming. The keys glow like a modern keyboard but are static. This lack of functionality encourages viewers to recall playing their favorite video game.
The piece is both an homage to and re-interpretation of Gabriel Orozco’s 1996 piece “Horses Running Endlessly.” In his work, he modifies the game of chess by increasing the size of the board from 8×8 to 64×64, and populates it with only Knights. This makes the game unplayable, and leaves the Knights, without their King or Queen, to wander aimlessly.
I utilize similar tropes in this piece by increasing the scale of the WASD keys to a size that makes them impossible to use with one hand – defeating the original purpose of WASD structure for gaming. The keys are locked in place so viewers are left to imagine how their avatar would be left to move aimlessly in it’s virtual world. These keys are intentionally made from common yet tough materials, such as plywood and OSB, to withstand the countless hours players could pound on them, losing themselves while wandering digital worlds.
This piece is part of a series of large scale buttons, keys and interface elements that are used for commentary on gaming, social media and control. Each work from this series incorporates a hybrid practice of graphic design, digital fabrication, traditional woodworking and physical computing. Commonplace materials are used for strength and durability as I view my works as art that should and can be touched.
alt option
Prototype for a giant keyboard – 2018
ALT Option was the first full scale key for the Giant Keyboard. At four feet square and 2 inches high, the key highlighted just how large a full 104 keyboard could be. It also shaped my process for creating: Endlessly Running, Scream and my current Shift key set.
