A collaboration between Dan McCulley and Tom Greenbaum
CURRENTS 2026
Bio:
Dan McCulley and Tom Greenbaum build interactive electronic art with a focus on whimsy and discoverability. They started collaborating at ISEA 2012, and have rekindled their partnership in retirement. Tom and Dan live in Albuquerque, NM and regularly meet to share ideas.
Statement of Work:
Building community through a collaborative Butterfly Automata. A kaleidoscope of butterflies will flutter and dance as collimated single directional light reflects off their shimmering wings. Participants will collaboratively build their community by adding and rearranging butterflies in the flock. They will also have butterfly pins to take home with them to show their community outside the walls of the exhibit.
This artwork helps build community through collective whimsy in a time of great polarization in our country.
Description of Work:
A kaleidoscope of butterflies will flutter and dance as collimated light will reflect off their shimmering wings. Participants will collaboratively build their community by adding and rearrange butterflies in the flock. They will also take butterfly pins home with them to help find their community outside the walls of the exhibit.
This is a table top exhibit that will require space for the automata, power for the light source and room for the vase of butterflies and will take home butterfly pins home with them. The automata will be ~3 feet square and about a foot tall..
The Automata consists of several screens that will hold the user added butterflies in place while allowing them to travel up and down as driven by multiple cam gears. Participants can place and rearrange the butterflies to design their own flocks by pushing butterflies through the grass layer, screen layer, and down to the motion gearing. A vinyl layer above the cams will allow the butterflies to be placed without risk of binding the automata. Collimated light shining across the exhibit will interact with the butterflies wings to change their colors and cause interesting secondary interactions.
Floor Plan:
Equipment List:
We’ll supply:
- Collimated light and lamp
- Automata
- Butterflies and vase to add to Automata
- Butterfly Buttons for Visitors to take
Equipment Needed:
- 6′ Table to hold a 3’x3′ automata w/ room for make and take.
- Power
Karmatetra 