“Tree of Life” is a real-time computing scanscape, new media art projection under construction by Marc Johnson. The artwork emerges from the largest 3D scanning of Moray archaeological site in Peru that was executed in November 2016. The piece will exist both as an autonomous work and as a performance where the artists will appear as operator, conductor, observer, and hacker. All the audiovisual components on stage will be constantly orchestrated and re-enacted simultaneously.
Real-time Computing, Artificial Intelligence, Lidar, 3D scanning within a new media art piece flirting with archaeology and conservation science by Marc Johnson.
In November 2016 the largest 3D scanning of Moray archaeological site in Peru was performed by a team composed of an archaeologist, computer scientist, architect, translator, agronomist, and peasant – lead by Marc Johnson. This site was used by the Quechua people (the Inca) in the 15th and 16th centuries as an agricultural laboratory, a center for plant hybridization and as a ceremonial site dedicated to the “Pachamama”, the Mother Earth. By using LiDAR technology to document this site, a digital clone of this environment was born, enabling preventive conversation of this national site. Additionally, the mission undertook historical examinations of the history and present status of this cultural heritage articulating notions of mythologies, oral transmission, mass tourism and public truth.
The project is engaging with and diverting from scientific digital data in a large-scale video installation as a testimony of archaeological research and geopoetic endeavor of the artist, revealing a new approach to the relationship between archaeology, agriculture and converging technologies as the core philosophical and cultural foundation of the work. Performers will appear in the work as operator, conductor, observer, and hacker. All the audiovisual components on stage will be constantly orchestrated and re-enacted simultaneously in this performance piece.