Save the Earth VS Destroy the Earth is an interactive installation. Two structures, built with the skeletons of old monitors, are holding two world globes, plus a sign indicating on one Save the Earth and on the other Destroy the Earth. The audience is invited to mime the action to save or destroy the Earth becoming a part of the artwork. Every action is monitored and photographed, leading to the creation of an image dataset of save-the-earth vs destroy-the-earth actions. Such dataset can be interpreted as sort of sentiment dataset, where actors express a negative or positive sentiment about the "Save the Earth" topic.
The installation "Save the Earth VS Destroy the Earth" was designed for the 4th
edition of Paratissima, which was held in 2008. Paratissima event [
The 2008 edition of Paratissima took place for the first time in San Salvario, a district of Turin with many problems of integration between residents and immigrants coming mainly from Africa. The objective of the event was to promote a dialogue between the people with the help of art. For this reason, after numerous site inspections, we chose to create an installation in the street that interacts directly with all the inhabitants of the district.
For interactive artworks, that require creative participation by the audience, an essential condition is the presence a large number of spectators. As the percentage of people willing to actively interact with the installation is minimal, estimated in the order of about 3-5%, only with a high number of visitors you can keep "alive" the work and trigger a phenomenon of creative imitation, even by the most timid. Also for this reason, the location chosen for the installation was Silvio Pellico Street, close to the Paratissima Info Point (see Fig. 1). Another significant element is the context in which the installation is proposed. The edition of Paratissima 2008 aimed to create an atmosphere of celebration and public involvement, essential conditions for the success of this work.
Two structures built with the skeletons of old monitors were holding two world globes; a sign under the first globe indicated 'Save the Earth', while a sign below the second one indicated 'Destroy the Earth' (see Fig. 2). The audience was invited to mime the action to save or destroy the Earth becoming a part of the artwork. Every action was photographed. During the three days of the event we shot 1,217 photographs.
The number of people involved was of 342. After a selection, were found to be 176 the actions of Destroy (see for instance Fig. 4-8,10-11, right side), Save 221 (see for instance Fig. 4-9 and 11, left side), and 8 Undecided (Fig. 9, right side; Fig. 10, left side). The sum of Save, Destroy and Undecided was higher than the total of the people involved because some of them performed both the Save and the Destroy actions. Fig. 7 Sample pictures: a save-the-earth action (left); a destroy-the-earth action (right)
This is an "unfinished" artwork, and requires outward participation to be accomplished. Moreover, it is “unsettled” because the narration's development is virtually unbounded and casual.