Dark Secrets
By Esteban Lafuente Fernández, Sara Stiber, Erika Nyström, Magnus Johnsson and Marlus Isaksson
Description
DARK SECRETS
This project aims to explore the way people act and interact with other people’s secrets.
It is not to be discarded as a source of gossip, although there is a fine line between the terms gossip and secrets. This is merely an attempt to play with curiosity.
Interaction:
At first glance, all you see is a black, velvet covered piece. When taking a closer look, you will see a small stand attached to the front of the installation. On top of the stand, is an old Bible with a hand marked out with lights. Simple instructions are written on the wall. So, you put your hand on the Bible (almost like swearing in to court, isn’t it?), and quietly you whisper an innocent secret in to the microphone in the wall. Let go of the Bible, and enter the curved corridor. The twinkling lights draw your attention to them. Whispers from inside the walls reach your ears from places around the corridor. When putting your ear against the wall, an unknown voice whispers a secret which you gladly absorb and keep to yourself.
There are 10 sound sources on the wall. Will you try to find them all? Is there an end to it? For how long do you dare to stay? Just how curious are you?
Technical:
The Bible contains a touch sensor which when pressed, activates the recording function after a 5 seconds delay. The delay is to prevent empty recordings due to people playing with the Bible and pressing it by mistake.
The recording device can store up to 60 seconds, and 10 seconds before it has run out of space, a lamp starts to blink to alert. The recording is sent randomly to one of the speakers inside the wall. It is then stored in that speaker until a new secret is directed to it, which deletes the old one.
There are twinkling lights positioned close to the speakers, so the visitors can locate the secrets more easily.
The Design:
The inner walls are padded and covered in black velvet cloth. This is to create an inviting setting for the visitors to interact with while leaning their ear against the wall. We want to make the experience welcoming and tranquil, since the visitors may stay inside the corridor for some time, trying to listen to all the secrets.
The Secrets:
How do we know people will share actual secrets and not just nonsense? Well, we don’t. And that’s part of the installation. We can’t decide what people should say or do, nor do we want to control that in any way. The people are part of the installation, whatever they do with it. It is possible the installations recordings will be personal ads, a forum of complaint, or perhaps an oral notice board. It’s exciting!
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