Tucked into a small gallery space in downtown Manhattan, there’s a big ball of light that knows how you breathe.
A product of international creative agency B-Reel, the installation PRANA uses radar sensors to track your breathing patterns, and using a simple software backend, translates the rhythm of your breathing into a pulsating light show.
A passion project of creative agency B-Reel which normally does digital films and interactive projects for brands, it came from art director Mike Potter’s interest in mediation, and the desire to create a visual extension of ones own lungs. Evocative of light artists like the renowned James Turrell, PRANA asks its viewers to step into a forest of lights hanging from the ceiling and simply breath for a few seconds. A sensor follows theirs movements and its signals are fed into software, which, using free web-based tech like Javascript, Node.js and Python, programs the lights into a corresponding casade.
Building on that ethos of open technology, they have released a public code editor, so anyone can program their own lightshow to run on the PRANA installation. PRANA is currently on display at the Friendman Gallery on 287 Spring Street in Manhattan until August 7th. In addition to the gallery’s normal hours, they are also hosting periodic performances inside of the sculpture.
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