Day In London – 16 February 2010
I had a wonderful day out today. I had seen an exhibition called ‘Decode: Digital Design Sensations’ advertised on Click on the BBC. It’s on at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, and being half term week, I thought that today would be a great opportunity to go and visit.
I went with my mum and dad, and the series of interactive displays merge computing with art and sculptures. A lot of this is simply CGI graphics, much like those you would see on a modern scrensaver. However, there was one which particularly caught my eye. Over a 24-hour period, one American tracked the thousands of planes flying in the airspace above the USA. He then visually plotted this with lines for each aeroplane, and made it play in a similar manner to a ‘time-lapse’ video. However, there was no background map, so you could work out where each airport was relative to the other ‘hubs’ of planes.
I was really glad I’d gone, though, I was dragged around cabinets and cabinets of plates and gold jewellery. I just thank whoever suggested free public Wi-Fi at the V&A. I played on my iPod, and surfed the web, whilst mother and father looked on intensely at each item on display.
It was a very worthwhile trip, except when I put my foot in the ‘pond’ outside the gallery in their courtyard, or ‘garden’. I was examining the artwork of mini-cameras hooked up to white LED panels, actually in the water, when I stood in the water. I felt so silly, but it was quite funny…
I advise you go to the exhibition, it runs until sometime in April.
Until next time,
Andrew.
