be part of the story with WALKSCREEN

the concept behind WALKSCREEN The two media artists Ruthe Zuntz and Michael Reitz founded WALKSCREEN in 2000. It is a company that focuses on a new way of art installations and also serves as an artistic platform that allows the two artists to collaborate with institutional, commercial, and artistic partners. At the beginning, Ruthe and Michael had invented what they called "walkscreens" a unique form of interactive installations in which photography and novel approaches to technology and engineering merge to create truly spectacular experiences: The two media artists continue to invent new ways some of the techniques are patented of incorporating the visitor s movement into installations that capture the spirit of vibrant urban places and transplant their essence to another place. Ruthe and Michael capture the life of places and their inhabitants. They take photographs, they interview people, and they record noises and sounds. In short: They develop an intimate relationship with the people and the places. They focus on details that may sometimes be small but that make all the difference. Each photograph is a story in itself and part of a bigger story at the same time. There is movement, there is light and shadow, there is happiness and sadness, rhythm and quietude. be part of the story with WALKSCREEN Stories unfold in front of our eyes. Every minute of every day. Our eyes absorb the images and send the information onto their way to our brain where they turn into new stories; into OUR stories. We interpret what we see; we charge what is visible with our emotions and our experiences. The stories "walkscreen" focuses on are inseparably connected with the places where they happen. Stories happen in real places and are always influenced by their social, biological and urban surroundings. But with "walkscreen" the visitors do not actually have to be in a certain place to experience the place s stories. The "walkscreen" installations are designed to capture and reproduce certain aspects of a place. Visitors can temporarily inhabit those places and experience for instance the vastness and speed of New York or the slowness and mysteriousness of Berlin. It is WALKSCREEN s major concern to incorporate the visitor into their art installations. WALKSCREEN installations are never about leaning back and enjoying the movie. On the contrary: The visitors are crucial to the installation. They become directors of the scenes and stories around them. Not until they participate will the installation begin. Their movements and their choices bring the stories to life. Without the visitors there would be a standstill. One of the WALKSCREEN artists motivations is to see the visitors emerge from their installation with shiny eyes and the conviction that they have physically been where the story took them.

walkscreen 1997 2005: Selected Installations and Performances

Moving Images Berlin New York (1997) "Moving Images" moves New York to Berlin. The lively and always hectic bundle of New York lifestyles, the irresistible New Yorkers, the noise, the everpresent insomnia, the sometimes comforting and sometimes inhumane anonymity are the focus of this project. And the aim of the project s result a huge installation is to capture the spirit and to allow visitors to experience the speed and unpredictability of New York. It was Ruthe Zuntz s aim to make the visitors experience what it really means to be in New York. The photographs were a result of close encounters and accidental meetings.

16 slide projectors and mirrors projecting on concrete floor 16 sensors control images and sound system Each screen on the ground tells a unique chapter of the New York story. One of the screens tells the story of dog parks, a place where only dogs and their owners are allowed to go. The visitors, presented with a grid of screens that resembles streets and avenues, is the accidental architect of a dynamic, colorful, ever-changing, and noisy version of New York. 16 slide projectors project more than 1.000 photographs onto the ground, covering an area of 600sqm. Each projector is equipped with a sensor that responds to even the tiniest movements of the visitor who is walking upon the photographs on the ground. With each movement a new photograph and a new corresponding soundbite appears. The visitors have no control; all they can do is walk around and render themselves to the pace of the city. Just like you have to do when you want to become part of New York.

Walkabout 1998 In Berlin you have to dig a little deeper before you find the city s stories. While New York happens in the streets, Berlin takes place in the backyards. With a complex camera construction, developed by WALKSCREEN for an effect we called look around photography, we shot series of photographs in the backyards of Berlin s historical center where history and stories are most intrinsically tied to one another. The visitors could enter the virtual backyards at their own pace and with full control of the speed with which the backyard stories unfold. The visitors walk into the 3D installation on an interactive carpet equipped with touch-sensitive sensors. With every step on the carpet the visitors enter the backyards further. Corresponding soundbites complete the experience.

The photographs are compositions of perceptions. They tell 12 exciting stories about different places and people in Berlin s Mitte district. With the different angles the artists use bird s eye view and worm s eye view and everything in between they offer the visitor entirely new ways to access the stories. The visitors turn into Lilliputs and Gullivers, towering above the scene in one second and crawling on the ground in the next. The effect is that of a pop up picture book: The reader of the story, the visitor, controls the speed with which the pages turn and thus the pace with which the story unfolds.

Development of the Walkscreen Idea The walkscreen installation turns the viewer into an active visitor and wanderer of cities. The visitors can immerse themselves in the structures of the city as the displayed photographs change according to the visitors arm movements. With a simple gesture of the arm, the visitors can change the perspective of the computeranimated city in front of them. The visitors control the images; they are part of the images; and they are, ultimately, part of the city. Illusion melts into reality. Ruthe Zuntz and Micheal Reitz photographed Neukölln, a part of Berlin that might be compared to the Bronx in New York. They took photographs shops that had to close down because they could not generate a sufficient turnover in the area. The empty shop fronts and the streets around them create a sense of desertion and loneliness. This installation focuses on structures and the absence of people, another aspect of urbanity. Thousands of photographs were the basis for a computer-animated version of the quarter's blocks. Four bundled sensors placed overhead gather every movement of the visitors arms and send the information to a computer that controls the animations on display.

The Gap 1999 In this installation, the visitor is once more the trigger for action. But this time not a complicated sensor system but only the ability of a solid body to cast a shadow is needed. Zuntz and Reitz photographed scenes, objects, and pieces of writing and overlapped them in a way that needed the visitor to uncover the stories. She wanted the visitors to be able to write their own stories with the movements of their bodies. The very minimalist interactive technique crosses the channels of light of two slide projectors and overlaps the projections. The result is a window of light. If visitors move between the screens and the projectors, they cast shadows of meaning onto the windows of light. Parts of photographs and snippets of texts appear in the shape of the visitors shadows.

What the hell is a Big City? 2002/2003 The nightlife area, the business district, the shopping street, the hip quarters, the rich quarters you can find them in New York, Berlin, Rome, Tel Aviv as well as in every big city around the world. Contemporary urban nomads can experience variations of corresponding parts of cities wherever they go. This installation focuses on globalized perceptions of cities. No-one needs to choose one favorite city anymore: You can take the best out of each city and assemble the pieces to one city that s perfect just for you. The visitors are presented with images of different cities shown on three big screens. What appears is one city simultaneously made up of fascinating, endearing, and unique details of New York, Berlin, Rome and Tel Aviv. Everyone can take a leap and dive into what becomes one big subjective city.

24/Seven 2004 The urban dweller needs a place that caters to his immediate needs, that satisfies his little addictions. It doesn t need to be fancy; it just needs to always be there and to always be open. The kiosk provides all this. It is the city organism s smallest provisioning cell. The vendors operate from inside the kiosk. Through the window that separates them from their customers, they can see the outside world only in fragments. The photo and video installation captures the kiosk owners perspective and displays them as urban cutouts. The world of the kiosk takes center stage and draws attention to an important feature of the urban environment.

Selected commercial projects 2005 Growing and Consuming Development of an imagery language for Germany s Federal Ministery for Consumer Protection, Food and Agriculture 2005 Downtown Berlin Discovering Berlin s new metropolitan attitude 2004 Fashion City Installation for the central plaza of Igedo, the world s biggest fashion fair, Düsseldorf, Germany 2003 Roaring Berlin Opening show for the Hugo Boss Flagship Store, Berlin 2000 AgriCultura The power of organic food presented in an overwhelming 600sqm barn, flooded by 45,000 photographs, reacting on every movement of the visitors.

Roaring Berlin (Hugo Boss) 2003

IGEDO Fashion Fair. Installation n central Plaza 2004

Downtown Berlin 2005

AgriCultura 2000

Imagery Language for German Federal Ministry of Consumer Protection, Food and Agriculture 2005

screen@walkscreen.de +49 30 443 56 177 tel +49 30 443 56 178 fax wörtherstrasse 15 d-10405 berlin (germany)