photo: Melissa Alexander
The South Bay Burners have been supporting Homouroboros
coming to San Jose. The “wrenches” are on call for
small repairs and maintenance, and the “docents”
have been the hosts of Homouroboros, with one of them there
anytime that the piece is up and running. It has been an
experiment in the community running an interactive art piece and
it has been a fabulous success!
Elecktra, one of the docents for Homouroboros tells us:
“So during my 2 shifts as a docent today, Sunday, I met a
couple who were staying at the Marriot which is 2 buildings PAST
the convention center, they were on the 26th floor on the
observation deck and heard monkey screaming!! so they went for a
walk to see where they were…… and found the art !! I
thought it was too cool!!
I also met a long time burner from the comic convention who
hasnt been since `99 and lives in Mendocino… came back
later with more buddys.
Also met a couple who had built the first Burning Man Greeters
Stations…. and their daughter who went to her first burn
at 8 months old… She is now 2 1/2… They had been
wanting to get involved with the south bay burners but wasnt
sure how… .. we met and she was thrilled!! “
Neon tells us:
“I had sooooo much fun on my shift last night! The
tourists and people of San Jose are really appreciating the
monkeys being in town. One woman, visiting her son in San Jose,
said in a long Southern drawl, after he told her the monkeys had
been at Burning Man, “Well I’ve never even heard of
Burning Man before, but now I want to go!” Then she turned
to me a minute later and said, “Are we allowed to make
noise on those drums?” And when I said yes, she ran toward
them squealing like a child. Maybe you had to be there to see
how cute this was, but, I tell you, it was a beautiful moment.
An earlier moment had a group of about 5 young kids, around 5-8
years old, all running around and around the drums, hitting each
one as they went by.
We had a few cars pull over…one was a group of people who
had just been tattooed, they were in that semi-altered
post-tattoo state and they stopped because they thought the
monkeys were actual people swinging from pole to pole…
We also had a few people from a comic book convention who were
really appreciative of the work. …
Then there was one woman who was asking me a lot of questions
and it took me a minute to figure out where she was coming
from…see, she thought that the monkeys were actually
swinging from branch to branch, so she was asking me if it was
the speed or the centrifugal force that would make them start
swinging. I could see that she didn’t understand any of my
explanations. Then when I finally said, “Do you see how
each monkey is in a slightly different position?” and then
when she saw that, I said, “They are stationary in that
position, they don’t move at all, they just look like they
move.” Then, she was so surprised, she screamed! It was so
funny….her mind was so blown, and she screamed and I
laughed and we high fived and then the monkeys started up
again…
And I look forward to my next docent shift! “
Originally posted May 19, 2008
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-egFKJvfmk]
– affinity
