Mister Peach writes:

This is documentation from the April 14th, 2011 demonstration of the etch-a-sketch / bulletin board project, undertaken for the Mediatecture class (Oliver Hess and Nik Hafermaas), and filmed at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California. This project is not affiliated with nor sponsored by the official, real-deal etch-a-sketch, its parent company, or, generally, anybody in a suit.

The boxes have shiny aluminum knobs. There is an arduino handling the controls. There is a rather solid processing sketch controlling the graphics.

Q: How is this mediatecture?

A: Art Center’s student dining room naturally serves as a 24-hour meeting place, rumpus room, town hall, and work lab. This is the social and architectural context that this project seeks to interact with and foster: somewhere to relax or work, meet or greet, see new work, and enjoy time away from the class rooms.

This project provides another layer of social engagement with: a twitter feed (pulling mostly student-written tweets related to Art Center), a clock (with both the date and the infamous Art Center week), and, most importantly, sketches drawn by real, live, interacting people who are sitting together at a table, and being watched by everyone in the room.

Interactive media that intersects the living context of a space, that is mediatecture.

Social Etch-A-Sketch; what a neat idea!