Permanent Internet and public art project
HEK House of Electronic Arts, Basel
CNC manufactured aluminium on steel skeleton, white coated
654cm x 423cm x 490cm (h/w/l)
cables, PC, and website with sound livestream in Flash player
Sitting on the flat rooftop of the HEK House of Electronic Arts, Basel, this cluster of intertwined mushrooms were digitally designed and CNC manufactured in white-coated aluminium. At the bottom of each mushroom there is a cable connecting all the members of the band to the Internet. At least it looks like that; the music performed by the mushrooms is not actually coming through these cables, but from a PC server. On the homepage of the project you can listen to the live stream, or ask at the counter of the House of Electronic Arts for a pair of wireless earphones if you wish to listen to the sound standing below the mushroom band.
In 2010 we were asked by the Christoph Merian Foundation, Basel to work out a project as a replacement for an earlier installation in public space, Revier, which had to be removed. The Dreispitz area in Münchenstein/Basel, where the mushrooms are located, is undergoing a reshaping process at a large scale. The sculpture had been removed from the rooftop and was stored during construction; for the reopening of the House of Electronic Arts in November 2014 it has been repositioned on the roof again.