SURVEILLANCE
CRADLES
Public Intervention
Beijing and Dunedin , 2017.
Surveillance Cradles is a series of inflatable helium sculptures that drift above events, transmitting live video from cameras mounted beneath them. The resulting footage can be streamed to physical installations, online audiences, or both simultaneously, creating a real-time connection between the event and its documentation.
The sculptures borrow from the visual language of monumental sculpture while remaining lightweight, awkward, and unpredictable. Suspended overhead, they sway and dart in the wind, embedding their own physicality into the footage they capture. Rather than functioning as invisible recording devices, they become conspicuous public objects.
Red Gate residency, Beijing
While the sculptures openly reveal the act of surveillance, their spectacle can also distract from it. Audiences are often drawn to their unusual presence, engaging with them as artworks rather than questioning their role as cameras. In this way, the project explores how surveillance can become normalised, aestheticised, or overlooked when embedded within entertainment, public events, and everyday life.
Occupying a space between sculpture, performance, and media intervention, Surveillance Cradles examines the relationship between observation, participation, and power in contemporary public space.
