Tori Foster           Work   Writing   News     Biography     Curriculum Vitae     Contact

One Kilometre, Two Minutes   Installation: 4,700 Map pins, 156" x 48", 2011.           Installation at WARC Gallery, Toronto, Canada, 2011       Description   One Kilometre, Two Minutes illustrates the emergent behaviour of moving vehicles on a kilometre-long stretch of highway over the course of two minutes. Time-lapse aerial captures that depict the fast lane of a multi-lane highway are taken every two seconds. These time-lapse captures are then placed side by side, centimetres apart, illustrating the flow pattern of complex multi-vehicular movement through a narrow corridor of space. The curved form of the highway is articulated only by the repetition of tail lights and brake lights. These lights are represented by pearl-head map pins fastened directly to the gallery walls (smaller pins represent tail lights, while larger pins represent brake lights). Moments of congestion are articulated by clusters of brake lights, while free-flowing traffic is represented by running lights distantly spaced from one another. Through the representation individual driving habits emerge: a large gap between the same two cars over the captured two minute duration appears as a wide river-like swath of negative space that stretches to the upper left corner; tailgaters clustered together create dense red ribbons of congestion; antsy lane changes cause other drivers to brake and relinquish hard earned territory.