Tree
Simon Heijdens
Mon 28 Nov – Sat 10 Dec 3.30pm until late
Free
Nature is becoming rare. Our surroundings are mostly artificial and only a small percentage of the country is made up of unplanned nature. Even things we perceive as nature, like the trees on the street, are carefully planned and managed and no longer natural. However, the wind blowing through its leaves is. Like footsteps in the sand or ripples on the water, there are still a few natural elements left in the urban environment.
Projected onto a large façade on the streets of Nottingham, Simon Heijdens’ Tree is an intervention that traces and amplifies these elements. The branches and leaves move slightly, with an intensity that depends on actual wind gusts. Its leaves are sensitive to sound. When there is a peak in the volume level, from a shouting passer-by or car horn, a leaf will break off the branch. Throughout the evening the tree will become barer and barer, thus creating an ongoing image of human activity.
Much of the working practice of Rotterdam-based designer Simon Heijdens stems from his fascination with Nature, which for him is an ongoing cycle of growth and decay processes affecting various characteristics of the physical world. Whereas architecture and design afford no space for normal cycles of growth and transformation over time, his work seeks to reintroduce the time factor into objects and environments that were conceived to be static. Heijdens believes that the things around us act as collectors of images, sensations and memories, and his projects enable those things to visibly manifest over the course of our experiences.
Simon Heijdens
Mon 28 Nov – Sat 10 Dec 3.30pm until late
Free
Nature is becoming rare. Our surroundings are mostly artificial and only a small percentage of the country is made up of unplanned nature. Even things we perceive as nature, like the trees on the street, are carefully planned and managed and no longer natural. However, the wind blowing through its leaves is. Like footsteps in the sand or ripples on the water, there are still a few natural elements left in the urban environment.
Projected onto a large façade on the streets of Nottingham, Simon Heijdens’ Tree is an intervention that traces and amplifies these elements. The branches and leaves move slightly, with an intensity that depends on actual wind gusts. Its leaves are sensitive to sound. When there is a peak in the volume level, from a shouting passer-by or car horn, a leaf will break off the branch. Throughout the evening the tree will become barer and barer, thus creating an ongoing image of human activity.
Much of the working practice of Rotterdam-based designer Simon Heijdens stems from his fascination with Nature, which for him is an ongoing cycle of growth and decay processes affecting various characteristics of the physical world. Whereas architecture and design afford no space for normal cycles of growth and transformation over time, his work seeks to reintroduce the time factor into objects and environments that were conceived to be static. Heijdens believes that the things around us act as collectors of images, sensations and memories, and his projects enable those things to visibly manifest over the course of our experiences.
Commissioned by Radiator Festival for New Technology Art, Tree is a key commission in Groundwork East Midlands’ Creative Regeneration Programme, which aims to embed the arts into the core work of the Trust.