Giant Joystick - Mary Flanagan

Another resource introduced to use during the week 1 lecture, Mary Flanagan's "Giant Joystick"

Multiplayer Atari, using a giant joystick from artist Mary Flanagan... "Inviting users to play classic arcade games by collaboratively moving on and controlling a 9-foothigh joystick (modelled after the 1980 Atari 2600 one), Mary Flanagan highlights the spatial and social role of the interface. The joystick itself becomes a social sculpture and territory for inter-personal communication."

I found this interesting in a similar fashion as the "safety pin", as the exaggeration of size makes an ordinary object (or in the joysticks case outdated) a lot more interesting than it really is. The joystick can be used to play original Atari games, and i think the fact that the size changes the experience makes it that more exciting. You need 2 people to operate the machine, and no doubt, movement will be a lot more restrictive and will require a lot more energy to perform.

In relation to this, I saw some works by photographer Vincent Bousserez in the local newspaper and he photographs minature figures doing everyday "chores", but what makes them interesting is his innovation to these figure doing their chores on life size objects, such as sunglases, pie, toilet tissue and so on