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Landscape of Expectations
The Installation
Physical description:
The installation consists of 21 big boxes placed in a spiral form which curls a single time. An opening is created between the two ends as an entrance for the visitor. The exterior offers a visual display of a number of expectations and attitudes towards new technology, with various types of image and statement.
The installation, plan - 4 zones
Exterior and interior: expression & colour scheme
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The interior of the installation
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| Some views at the exterior of the installation |
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The inside of the installation is designed as an interactive questionnaire, where the visitor can engage with the installation in various ways:
- The visitors are asked various questions and mark their answers physically in different ways.
- The visitors can read a number of different arguments and choose to add their own as well as cover some of the other arguments if they disagree with them.
- The visitors can search for more knowledge in the special ‘KNOWLEDGE boxes’
- The visitors can enter the special ‘reflection rooms’, where themes cover expectations towards the future as well as visitors’ own influence on public deliberation.
- The visitors can utilise different sets of building blocks which correlate to different sets of arguments.
There is no predetermined route in the installation, and visitors are free to choose how and whether they wish to interact with the different elements. But when the visitors choose to become participants by interaction, they leave traces for the subsequent visitors.
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Examples of interactive questions
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Conceptual description:
The installation is about Danish expectations and attitudes towards science and new technology. It is developed on the basis of studies of the public debate about biotechnology in Denmark and demonstrates different arguments and attitudes in space, text and visual images. In this way, it displays an argumentative landscape at the same time as it invites visitors to participate actively in the debate. The installation is changing its appearance as visitors participate. In this way it illustrates how the landscape of public debate is constantly shaped when citizens participate. The installation, therefore, solicits reflection and opinion formation within the individual, at the same time as it makes this process visible as something which takes place in a social setting.Specifically, the installation takes its point of departure in four different discourses – or types of argumentation. Some of them are generally positive towards the beneficial contribution of science to society, whereas others are negative (read more in Horst: Controversy and Collectivity). The exterior of the installation represents these different types of argumentation visually and with sets of statements. In the interactive inside of the installation these four types are brought into play. The four sets of building blocks are inspired by the four discourses and a number of the arguments and questions asked can also be connected to them. But there is no fixed or straightforward connection between answers to questions, building blocks and arguments. For instance, some of the building blocks can be connected in a way that mixes the four forms, just as it is not possible to refer all the answers to questions back to the four discourses. Within certain frames the visitors are therefore free to associate different elements as they wish. This illustrates how we as citizens on the one hand are free to form our own opinion, but on the other hand always do this in a social context which defines some boundaries for what it is possible to say in a meaningful way. |
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How should ressources be distributed?
- prioritise different areas |
More examplas of interactive questions
- what can human stem cells legitimately be used for?
- argue for your chioses by writing in the squares. You can cover other peoples arguments so the next visitor will not see them |
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Visitors are filmed while interacting with the installation.
The footage is later analysed as part of the evaluation of the installation. |
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