House Swarming: Haunting Installation That Measures Air Quality

A mysterious, alien moss has blanketed the walls outside the Pasadena Center for Art and Design, creeping inside the entrance. At night, it glows with lights that blink on and off in strange patterns. No, the Tripods haven't invaded the greater Los Angeles area. This skein of green, organic-looking nodes is House Swarming, the latest biopunk art installation created by LA art geeks Jenna Didier, Oliver Hess and Marcos Lutyens (Didier and Hess run Materials & Applications, a tech/art think tank).

I was lucky enough to see House Swarming a few weeks ago. In person, its sheer size is overwhelming -- the installation is two stories high, and stretches all the way down a long hall inside the Art Center. Walking underneath it at night, you genuinely feel like you've encountered an alien life form, especially because the blinking lights seem to have a life-like rhythm rather than something generated by computer. That's because the lights are responding to something organic: air quality. According to the artists:

At twilight, the swarm comes to life, telling visitors and passersby about the current air quality around the building.
Electronic sensors perceive air contaminants – such as tobacco, benzene, carbon monoxide, even perfume – and separately inform the outside and inside swarms, which sets off signals. These signals are interpreted as changes to the natural rhythm that the network has established based on the number and distribution of nodes connected to the cable net. Flashing cells on the exterior facade indicate air quality inside the building. Conversely, pulsating effects in the interior entry inform visitors about the outside air quality. The flashing lights become indicators of the environment like dramatic clouds at sunset that forewarnings of storms at night.

The results truly are dramatic. House Swarming is both functional and haunting, reminding us that our toxic emissions are about to turn Earth into an alien landscape.