Feature Details

Name: Idea Tree

Description: Creating a social space bringing together Convention Center event goers and the general public, the project’s central element is a 40’ diameter canopy, supported by three groups of columns. The canopy is created with six interlocking steel rings intricately held in tension by steel cables, covered by translucent polycarbonates 'leaves.'Critical to Yang’s concept for the artwork is the gathering of spoken ideas. Adjacent to the Tree is the project’s sculptural sound “booth” (the “Seed”) where a sensor activated, audible prompt, encourages community to leave a short voice message. Once a day before morning, messages are wirelessly transmitted to sound equipment housed at the center of the canopy (the “Fruit”), where audio messages are reassembled to create the haiku-like whispers within the Tree. Some whispers remain over time; others fall away into an ever-evolving ambient music-like soundscape that the artist describes as a “self-sustaining ecology of ideas