SHAPING

URBAN INSTALLATION

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Upstream is an urban outdoor interactive installation.  Set up in Paris, for the “Nuit Blanche”, in 2005, on the city square of Paris (France) and for a second edition, in 2006, in Bucarest (Romania).

Upstream is an interactive game in which the players interact with a giant vertical screen by tracking colored rectangles displayed on the ground.

On the vertical screen, we can see crowds in movement. At the beginning of each game, all the people inside the crowds are hidden by colored rectangles and, these rectangles are simultaneously projected on the ground. By walking on a rectangle the player releases it, both on the floor and on the vertical screen. Then, the character which was hidden is revealed on the vertical screen as if the rectangle was erased. At the same time, a sound occurs. Thus, each group of players produces a sound and visual flow which is different for each game.

This device doesn’t require any equipment for the players. Consequently, players are free of their movements. By running, walking or jumping on the rectangles, the players replay the rhythm of the crowds displayed on the vertical screen and they perform that, in an unvoluntary but original choreography. The players are so focused on their goal that they do not care about their own gestures. The interaction of the players takes place in both individual and collective perception of themselves.