ARTIST CREATES ELECTRONIC MUSIC WITH VINTAGE VOTING BOOTHS

Artist turns old voting booths into mini music studio

WEST LONG BRANCH, NJ, UNITED STATES, October 29, 2024 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Artist Mike Richison has created an interactive art installation that lets you create electronic music with video clips from presidential debates and rallies. He embedded eight iMacs into old voting booths, each with the capability of creating a techno-inspired beat. This installation is currently on display at the Rotary Ice House at Monmouth University in West Long Branch, New Jersey. The project is part of Richison’s one-person show Election Collection: 2004-2024 which features twenty years’ worth of his election-themed video work.

This body of work began in 2004 with a humorous looped video of former President George W. Bush drinking water during his debate with John Kerry. Every four years since then, Richison has created a new project, culminating in his latest project, Electo Electro.

Electo Electro fuses together iPads, iMacs, original software, and the husks of Diebold AccuVote TS voting booths. The result is an interactive mini music studio that a gallery attendee can use to remix video and sound from news, rallies, and debates. The stations are controlled by a custom-designed iPad touchscreen interface that includes a Roland TR 808-inspired percussion sequencer that works like a video beatbox, a keyboard-based vocoder that samples phrases from the candidates and lets you build a melody, and even a digital turntable that you can use to scratch the audio and video samples. The iPad layout is a nod to the actual screen of the Diebold AccuVote TS, an antiquated computer voting booth that debuted in 2002 and was used as late as 2018 in the Georgia gubernatorial election. Shortly after the AccuVote’s introduction, a group of researched discovered several glaring security flaws in its design – flaws that could have allowed lost or stolen votes. The overall effect of the eight stations is another reference to a real-life polling station.

The content of the project will be continually adapted according to upcoming events and news. The gallery is open during weekdays from 10 am to 5 pm, and on weekends by appointment. Richison’s Electo Electro can be experienced in personal at the gallery or during daily Twitch performances at twitch.tv/electoelectro. The project can also be found on Instagram at @electoelectro and Tik Tok, also at @electoelectro. You can find a schedule of upcoming performances and videos of the project, as well as learn more about the project itself at www.electoelectro.com. Audio from the stream will be remixed and uploaded to the project Soundcloud account: soundcloud.com/electoelectro.

Mike Richison is a multimedia artist and an Associate Professor at Monmouth University, where he teaches motion graphics. He employs a variety of approaches to artmaking, including sculpture, graphic design, and interactive video. His work utilizes found objects such as turntables, voting booths, and scavenged video clips as well as the Max MSP Jitter programming environment.

Mike Richison
Monmouth University
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Demonstration of Electo Electro