It’s -26C. It sounds much scarier than it is. In reality it means that prepping to go outside is a lengthy business and the nose freezing inside is an intriguing sensation. Am being silent and reclusive. Breaking from one Bed to make music or sleep in the other. The light is more than stunning. So quiet.

London surely reaching for the sky exponentially.

It’s all so obvious.
We talk, we play, I move his sounds in the Bed as he plays.
The duetting is very close and precise. We are super focussed
with our time and productive. We are working in new arenas
for both of us with such trust and we don’t know where we will end up.

No time to waste. Bed is unpacked and installed in the main space at Rich Mix
looking onto Bethnal Green Road. We are about to begin 5 months of working in
a truly open studio : open to to look into and out of, and open for anyone to enter.
Shri arrives this afternoon to begin our collaboration to make a new work.
He plays instruments.
How will I handle these in the Bed ?

We are angry. Bed comes back from ARS on time but damaged. After all that
careful packing for the trip out and then such high standards of skill
and care by the technicians at the OK Centrum, its extremely disappointing
that the pack up for the way home somehow fell short. Only one thin layer of bubble
wrap around the polished ends, again, packed into a huge container lorry which
bumped its way back here, the flimsy packing torn to shreds on arrival.

We should be open 24 hours

Visitors flood in continuously, surprised and delighted at the experience. Many
think that its interactive and climb out commenting on the subtlety of the
interactivity.
” …..so is it the weight of my buttocks or their temperature that causes those gorgeous
bass frequencies to modulate ? ”
I am spending all and every day watching people experience it and answer their questions.
It’s fascinating and they love it
So much for the conference.

The workers give it a test and realise what all the work was about.
It’s only now that I realise how wooden and cozy/analogue? this work is.
The other side of that curtained door there are hundreds of computers and
monitors and black surfaces and visibly fast moving hard surfaced technology
and dark dark rooms. Here the white blinds sway in the summer breeze and bodies
trip happy on simple music.
The OK centrum is presenting the Interactive Arts Prize winners for ARS Electronica 2006.

Good morning and David has arrived to sort the automated loading of
appropriate software on booting of the computer. Also fine tuning the
webcam causing visitor presence to turn the Bed music on and off.
We are running on a new MacMini which is a small and powerful Intel
Mac that will run without monitor. Perfect for installations. However, it
had required new versions of Max and MOTU driver updates in London,
so this is the first time we have run all this together. We test and retest.
Meanwhile I get in Bed and wire up all the amps and speakers and by
noon we are happily running. ~ and doesn’t she sound sweet.

I have arrived and so did Bed. Fine and fast.
Our space at the OK Centrum für Garegenwartskunst, is large, still and block wooden floored
with big windows that they are already making plain white blinds for. After a welcome ARS glass,
Rudi, Hans and Kaffe come down and unwrap and measure and screw it all together.
It’s essential for the Bed to sit 100% square abnd horizontal otherwise the corners and tops won’t
slip perfectly into place. Its late but Freidl’s rule and Austrian diligence solves the wobbly floor and
we’re not too late for sleeping.