vis 2 interventions

in·ter·vene

  1. To come, appear, or lie between two things
  2. To occur as an extraneous or unplanned circumstance
  3. To involve oneself in a situation so as to alter or hinder an action or development
  4. (Law.) To enter into a suit as a third party for one's own interests.



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#1 - obstruction

Taking an object's sole purpose and perverting it, so that others are wary of utilizing it. I simply dipped string in mustard and mayonnaise and stretched it across the doorway. Repeated this until the doorway had no holes through which a person could comfortably pass through. I wanted to not only make it hard to pass through the door, but to make it so that people would not want to pass through it for one reason or another, despite the fact that the place they need to get to is just on the other side and clearly visible.

Students often took one look at the door and chose to go around to the back door of the room. Others came close and put a hand on the string, as if they were going to move it out of the way and step through regardless, but would belatedly realized that there was not-quite-liquid substance smeared all over the strings and retreated quickly with exclamations of "eww!" :)

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#2 - spectacle

Reflecting on the human tendency to rubberneck. I used yellow caution tape, white spray paint, and glass bottles to recreate a simple crime scene, just to the side of Library Walk. The tape roped off a largeish section of area that people don't normally tread through, but is frequently passed by, to emphasize the idea of it being a "sideshow" and not something that requires people to pay attention to it. Sprayed a "dead body outline" on the ground with the paint and added a couple glass bottles in order to encourage onlookers to come up with their own story of what might have happened. Then I sat on the side and unobtrusively filmed reactions with a small video camera.

I enjoyed the irony of creating literal bait in order to attract bystanders to come look and see, while understanding for myself that the people who stopped to stare were the spectacle to me.

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