Slipstream Konza

:SLIPSTREAM KONZA:
Digital Prints in a Data Landscape




Slipstream Konza is an art/science collaborative project that addresses
aesthetics of digital data expression of land as a breathing ecosystem.
Slipstream Konza uses the time based data stream of carbon flux as a basis
for a generative, rhythmic, virtual expression of sound and image in net
based and spatial installation.

<http://christinamcphee.net>

<http://christinamcphee.net/texts/konzasuite.asp>

Slipstream Konza is complemented by a group of digital prints based on
medium format photography shot on location at the Konza Prairie Biological
Field Station, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The digital prints of the
KONZA series are created from photographs shot at sites of scientific
experimentation and instrumentation on the prairie.


Remnants of tallgrass prairie in North America are concentrated in an area
east of the Rockies where the dry, prevailing winds from the Pacific over
the Rockies collides with the moist, warmer air rising north from the Gulf
of Mexico. Annual rainfall is around 35 to 40 inches in an area immediately
east of the arid high plains (about 10 -15 inches per year). Thanks to the
frequent lightening storms as well as human intervention, the tallgrass
prairie is a fire based ecosystem: its grasslands are created and
perpetuated by frequent intervals of fire, much like the chaparral of
California. Without fire, the grassland reverts to a cedar and oak
savannah. Intensive biological study of tallgrass prairie has characterized
the last thirty years as its range has receded. The prairie is of global
interest for research on immediate and long-term climate change.



Konza is the Osage term for