Improbable Monument

I call it the Silicon Valley Wafer. A six foot replica of a Silicon Wafer atop a three foot pedestal. The pedestal contains the inscription, "For those who see the world through the lens of technology, this is a marvelous place." The Santa Clara county has come to be known as Silicon Valley. The term originally referred to the region's large number of silicon chip innovators and manufacturers, but eventually came to refer to all the high-tech businesses in the area; it is now generally used as a metonym for the American high-tech sector. Despite the development of other high-tech economic centers throughout the United States and the world, Silicon Valley continues to be the leading hub for high-tech innovation and development, accounting for 1/3 of all of the venture capital investment in the United States. Stanford University, located within Silicon Valley, has been a major reason for the technological advancement in the area. This is where I have chosen to put my Improbable Monument.

As a student, and a previous engineering student, I understand the need for motivation to work hard and the thrill of being on the 'inside' of any kind of riddle. My monument serves to do both. As a symbol of the community the spectacle of a big shiny thing in the middle of a quad is marvelous. Located on a campus that has a Rodin sculpture garden in it though this would seem rather 'ho-hum.' The inscription on the base is ment to be a clue. A clue that there is more to this monument. Looking at the monument through your smartphone camera feature would reveal the logos of major tech companies that have grown to make the valley famous. Standing at different locations in the quad would reveal different logos as demonstrated by my Google Earth Moch-up.



Conventional monuments are ment to be widely visible, so they are typically large. Mine will not be. Conventional monuments exist only in the real world. The primary component of my monument is virtual. The fact that it is mostly virtual is the point of the monument. The monument commemorates those who live their lives through the lens of technology and serves to motivate those who will continue to move the regional culture forward along with the rest of the world.

My Estimated cost is about 200,000. About two thirds toward building the monument and the rest toward app development. Simple concrete with a brushed bronze plate around the outside of the wafer. Simple and easy to work with materials because the focus of the project is not on the physical icon, though it does have it's own meaning.

And it looks like the GE program is not responding well so here is a link to the KMZ file for downloading and running the tour locally instead.

https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B0zJSF5CQDCYZWVlYzk2NTQtMjQxZS00OWY5LWExZjUtYTJhNThhMTgyYWFm&sort=name&layout=list&num=50

Google Earth example Artists

I have updated my google earth project with a comment that serves as a commentary on the piece. In addition to that I would like to point out two artists who inspired the work. The first is Evert Schut, who is a scientist AND an artist. That alone inspires me but the man's work is also amazing. He is a painter who paints landscapes from a perspective only visible to him via Google Earth. His work and philosophy surround Google Earth and art can be viewed here: http://googleearthart.blogspot.com/ The other is a Colorado art professor who's blog I encountered in my research and gave me the idea to give the new perspective that Schut talks about to my daily commute. The artists name is David Schaal and in his post 'psychogeographic vblog' he displays a person, looking bored agains what looks like a daily routine gps track. You can view this piece here: http://www.davidschaal.net/ and afterwards will likely see parallels with my piece.