Blossom Branch

Blossom Branch is an adapted project for the Digital Arts Computing Degree Show 2020. A mechanical sculpture made up of wire, 3D printing, an arduino, servo and fallen branches. 'flash', in this context, is using the definition: to display obtrusively and ostentatiously. The audio track gives a glimpse to the conceptual, with transcript below. See here for Documentation, here for Github, here for background video on youtube, and here for just one view of the branch video

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with a flower, what do you look at first?
the petals, the smell, the flash, the beauty
and the flash is great and all but
it distracts from the whole
it hides the working cogs
the stalk and sepal that hold the flower head up
it hides the receptacle that protects the organs

pre lockdown I was looking into care, and lack there of
particularly for maintenance workers online and off
even through lockdown we were celebrating the key workers,
the workers highlighted as critical to running our society,
the cogs that keep everything smooth sailing
and then in the same line, giving little to no resources,
many were forced to go in as they couldn't afford not to,
care wasn't given - care isn't being given - to those who care for us
those that keep us together are most at risk and are least cared for
how does that even work?

we, the profiteers off a deeply biased system, were too busy looking at the flash
baking banana bread and sourdough starters,
I mean we're not even distracted by the flash,
we are the flash. we deem ourselves to be the petals
we get away with being distracted by our own matter(s)
at the expense of those holding our hands and driving our buses
this isn't new news by any means, that we need to melt the flash
to rejiggle the care for those that maintain us
begin to de-tangle, de-stress, de-escalate
merge, melt, mix
reorient the flower to look past the petals
for otherwise we are complicit in our apathy