Wavespan (2023)

Commissioned by the Seattle Office of Arts and Culture for SDOT Northgate Pedestrian Bridge

15’H and 130’W x 7’D - aluminum pendulums, steel support arms, stainless cable, 2 sensor motor pairs.

A series of 15-foot tall, vertically swinging pickets loosely spaced along 130 feet of the pedestrian walkway are coupled together in such a way that motion in one propagates to its neighbors. In this way, motion at one end creates a wave that propagates down the whole 130 feet. A sensor and motor at each end of the sculpture register passing pedestrians and initiate wave motion that matches people’s walking speed. The wave becomes the wake of people’s passage; a slowly decaying trace of pedestrian motion across the bridge.