HyperCollider

In 1905 Einstein published his Special Theory of Relativity, overthrowing notions of absolute space and time. A century later Henschke explores in both the physical world and online the extremes of relativity and how they disturbed Einstein's own cosmological philosophy of a balanced, logical and eternal universe. This is something that new media has not tackled before. It distils complex physics in an audiovisually intuitive and exploratory way. The device is a hybrid of a remade 1920s German pinball game, gramophone player and particle accelerator. Inside the machine is a collage of pieces from early relativity textbooks and Einstein's own handwritten notes pressure graphs and star charts, combined with a computer display running a simulation. The audience interacts through flipper buttons and an antique spring-loaded trigger, launching a selection of subatomic particles into a theoretical universe. Particles bounce off one another into a black hole in the centre manifold, where players observe spatial and temporal dilation effects at first hand. Its 'pop-science pop-music' soundtrack was constructed from particles of sound, commencing with familiar early C20th sounds, ending in sound environments potentially of future aeons. Henschke developed HyperCollider as inaugural online artist in residency at NGA. Created as part of the Metis 2004 festival, it was the first work exhibited at Spatial, a 2004 NGA initiative providing an online environment for electronic art works, and then at the 'Symmetry' website at Stanford Linear Accelerator Centre. The Film Victoria Digital Media Fund enabled further development. The work was shown at Feb 05 open day, Australian Synchrotron. It was exhibited in the World Year of Physics Art Prize at Macquarie University Art Gallery (05-06). As the winner it was acquired for its permanent collection. Via the project, Henschke has been Artist in Residence at the Australian Synchrotron and visited the Large Hadron Collider, CERN Geneva