Space Snake
Participatory mobile puppet – First Night Boston (New Year’s Eve Arts Celebration)
- Completion Date: 1983
- Media: PVC pipe, knit fabric, aluminum tubing & sheet stock, wood, plastic light fixture, wheel chair, auto battery and head lamp
- Location: BCA plaza, and Downtown Streets, Boston, MA
- Client: First Night, Inc
- Dimensions: 9 ft (H) x 6 ft (W) x 200 ft (L)
- Budget (costs): $1,000 plus in-kind donations of materials and labor
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This 200 ft long mobile puppet rests on the Boston Center for the Arts plaza in preparation for its nighttime walk through Boston streets. Over 100 city young dancers (members of Boston City Lights) moved the snake down Boylston Street during the People’s Procession on New Year’s Eve. The head of the Space Snake is mounted on a wheelchair base that was pushed along the streets. It holds a D-cell auto battery that provided the power for the two headlights within the globe –shaped eyes. This Space Snake was part of two successive First Night Boston events as well as being stretched out on the Boston Common as part of WBZ TV Kid’s Fair. Over 500,000 people, young and old alike, walked through the body an otherwise interacted with the large mobile puppet during its three-year life.
Gallery
"My sculptural environments are aesthetically pleasing site-specific artworks that connect nature and culture by employing the three legacies for regenerative and sustainable design of (1) environment: natural systems, (2) education: experiential systems, and (3) engagement: cultural systems. By using a variety of art media and fabrication methods to create sculptural open spaces that are intended to support personal rejuvenation and inspiration, my sculptures provide venues for environmental learning and community celebration.”
Contact
Environment, Education, Engagement
Michael Roy Layne, Ph.D., RLA, ASLA
Environmental Sculptor • Landscape Architect • Community Artist
Studio/Workshop
135 South Main Street
Warrenton, North Carolina 27589
Office
442 S. Main Street
Warrenton, North Carolina 27589
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