Call and Relay

Video Pool welcomed residents of Winnipeg to talk to strangers via two intriguing new media projects by Germaine Koh.

Call was an interactive installation involving a hacked vintage rotary-dial telephone that connected immediately to one of several volunteers as soon as the receiver is lifted. Participants were invited to experience the unique opportunity of striking up a conversation about anything or everything with an anonymous individual at the other end of the line.

Relay was a subtle intervention that combined the lonely signal of a flashing navigation beacon, a city electrical systems, and the invisible communications networks that surround us. A utilitarian light fixture enigmatically flashed – in Morse code – short text messages (SMS) received on a designated mobile phone number. Locally, the light would operate as a sort of bulletin board conveying news from near and far, and providing opportunities for sociability and local messaging in the immediate area and across the city. The beacon merged early technologies for communication and navigation with some of the more
contemporary methods by which information and desire flow today.

Call and Relay was presented thanks to generous support provided by: