100 Trippy Balloons Do the Atom Dance

A designer collective called Electric MoOns has created what they called "balloon ballet"—an installation of 100 balloons bunched together in a LED-lit grid in a pitch dark room. It is, its creators believe, the world's largest 3D balloon display, and when it's not floating eerily in its multi-ovular matrix, it does a kind of flash dance—dubbed "Atom"—that goes along with some trippy music and a light show.

Image by Electric MoOn

Electric MoOns via DesignBoom

4:30 PM on Thu Jan 10 2008
By LISA KATAYAMA
2,010 views
12 comments

Comments

JoeyTheHobo at 05:17 PM on 01/10/08
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Um, is there a point to this?
Oh, I guesss they can't allow the point anywhere near the balloons....
tetracycloide at 05:27 PM on 01/10/08
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Connectedness Index: 114

the world's largest 3D balloon display? that appears to imply there's a 2D display of balloons that is larger still...
Dug at 05:30 PM on 01/10/08
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Yea!

More techno-art please!
Whyaduck at 06:59 PM on 01/10/08
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That's some elegant engineering right there. I expect initially they just wanted to illuminate spheres moving on the z-axis, which meant hanging fairly heavy stuff from the ceiling or lot's of mechanical engineering on the floor. Substituting helium balloons makes the installation pretty damned simple. Very nice. Plus, trippy!
amysisson at 07:40 PM on 01/10/08
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Years ago I saw a dance performance by a man in a completely darkened auditorium, who timed his jumps to match flashes of a strobe light. The audience never saw him with his feet on the ground, and the strobe flashes were close together, so it appeared he was flying. I'm always impressed with new and innovative art, even if, as in the case of the balloons, it doesn't pack an emotional punch for me. It's still creative and new, and therefore worth spending at least a few seconds looking at.
Eac_o_System at 09:14 PM on 01/10/08
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This makes the stop-watch microscope woman look down-right normal. Strangest use for these things since Ron paul's group thought they could use their blimp to win elections.
El_Bandito at 10:44 PM on 01/10/08
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Does anyone know what the music/trippy track was? And where I can score it?
Knirfie at 03:48 AM on 01/11/08
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I saw this weeks ago live at an Expo here in the Netherlands.
Knirfie at 03:49 AM on 01/11/08
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I saw this several weeks ago at an expo here in the Netherlands. Can't say it was really exciting to watch...
strider_mt2k at 04:40 AM on 01/11/08
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Connectedness Index: 717

I used to think that balloons were buoyant, fragile, almost spiritual things.

Now I see they only want to program us to do something for them.
(I looked away in time, others may not be so lucky.)

Balloons used to be cool, now they're digital and evil or somethin'!

WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME????

WHAT DID YOU DO TO MEEEEE?
lucyzero at 11:21 AM on 01/11/08
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Balloons=totally evil

viz. The Prisoner
FrankenPC at 01:46 PM on 01/11/08
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Wow...I had to stop the movie. I was getting a headache. Wouldn't want a seizure at work.

I remember in the 80's, (while dropping acid) our idea of a trip was to lie on the ground and have two people take a strand of Christmas lights and swirl it over our heads like a jumping rope. That was as techno as it got. Oh, and we played Zepplin in the background.