Juncture is a participatory, public space, media environment about historical memory, cultural identity, and collective recognition in Los Angeles. The core content component of the environment is the Remapping-LA interpretive media database, containing thousands of historical images, videos, and sounds enriched by layers of metadata including temporal and geographical information, descriptive texts, and extensive tagging. Junction is a collaboration between REMAP/UCLA, California State Parks, Walt Disney Imagineering, and CENS/UCLA. Contributions included conceptualizing the interface mock-ups, participating in creative development, and producing online and print content.

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What began as a simple end of the year party ended in a culmination of art, music, community, history, technology, and last but not least—tacos. UCLA’s TFT course in Interactive Multimedia teamed with REMAP to explore the history of Los Angeles through the integration of cutting edge Nokia N83 mobile devises and Cisco Systems WiFi grid. We used these devices to map Los Angeles in innovative ways using GPS and REMAP’s massive image database.

Monumento 872 was, at it’s core, a way of sharing these “maps” with the community. Though the collaborative conception of our class, this event was born. We could not have made it happen without the support of the REMAP team, especially Vids Samanta and Jeff Burke. Vids was the key programmer who developed the Python software for the Nokia Devices. They were loaded with a “GPS medal detector” application. When you came in proximity of a defined GPS location, your device would be fed a “hidden treasure” in the form of historical information and images about the location you were at.

The event was a huge success with a turnout of over 1000 people of various sub-cultures from across Los Angeles. It took place a Chiperaki and the adjacent historical park just north of Chinatown. The event include various music artists performing in the park, a mixed media art show, taco truck, and the interactive devices.

This piece deconstructs the audio of Matmos’ “Germs Burn for Darby Crash” through a animated visuals in which the spectator is taken on an journey though abstract interpretation of internal physiology. The animations are controlled through live performance with a bandaged appendage. The piece was performed as part of the Visual Music Concert at UCLA’s Design | Media Arts department under the direction of Casey Reas.