Interactivity for Artists Workshop embeds LEDs into borax crystals

Interactivity for Artists was a workshop organised by VJ London and sponsored by DesignSpark. It took place on the 25-26 of February in London's Hackney Wick, an area renowned for its large population of artists.

The idea was to provide a short crash-course from which participants walked away with a working interactive artwork giving them in the process an introduction to electronics, programming and interactivity. The workshop was lead by Michał Mitro, a multi-media artist currently based in the Czech Republic.

After a brief introduction to electronics theory, participants got hands-on with breadboards, resistors and LED’s while starting to assemble their pieces experimenting along the way. The next step was to embed LEDs into borax crystals. Small textile pouches containing the LED’s were coated in PVA and then suspended into a saturated borax solution. While the crystals were slowly forming, the participants were introduced to the Arduino platform,its programming and running through its many possibilities finally focusing in the matter at hand, interaction using proximity sensors.

At the end of the first day the crystals were thriving and the students eager to connect them to their projects.

Day 2 consisted of assembling the devices connecting the electronics to the LED’s in the crystals and then experimenting with the code to achieve the sensitivity and reaction that they desired from their devices.

Everyone walked away with a unique interactive object and the necessary knowledge to carry on exploring further.