Tough Art

The Childrens Museum presents its second year of this exhibit series showcasing interactive art works by four artists who got the chance to make their art “tough” enough to withstand kid handling during a three-month summer residency. 
Featured artists are:
Ben Bigelow, Pittsburgh, PA
Interact with a fantastical forest of light that combines 3-D projection, stop-motion animation, sound and interactivity. Through destruction, revelation and regeneration, the fate of this bizarre forest is at your command.
 
David Butts, Portland, Oregon
David created "Giant," a 10-foot tall puppet kinetic sculpture that children (and adults) can manipulate with levers and cables. "Giant" can turn, nod, grasp and reach out toward the sun, the moon and a star. 

Rick Gribenas, Pittsburgh, PA
Rick will present three new pieces that will incorporate custom LEDs, micro-processors, sensors and sound in three separate locations in the Museum. The suite of works will center on the ideas of suspension, floating and the unknown to invoke a quiet sense of wonder in otherwise unnoticed spaces and times in the Museum.
Wendy Osher, Pittsburgh, PA
“Bullies in Our Woods” invites visitors to enter a wooden structure woven with invasive vines and saplings from our city parks. Once inside, sounds of sirens and bird songs, buses and brooks, and a projection of the changing skies above our urban forest offer a memento to stop and think: what are these invasive “bullies” doing in the woods in our city?
Tough Art is supported by a grant from the Federal Institute of Museum and Library Services.