Photo: Nadja Herreshoff
What will we do with a limited resource? Use it wisely or use it up? These choices are apparent in the refashioning of three children’s games, built eight-times larger than normal size, and arranged in a fenced “play area.” Participants are invited to play the games (Labyrinth, Shoot the Moon, and Dominos). Winning strategies embrace smart resource use and reject waste.
Labyrinth, the knob-controlled tilting maze, is constructed 7 feet across, uses a 3-inch ball, and relabels its obstacles with ideas of waste. Avoid waste to win!
Shoot the Moon, in which careful control of its two rods guides a steel ball uphill, is built 10 feet long to use a bowling-ball. This game relabels its positive goals as renewable resources.
Dominos are eighteen inches long and decorated with images of non-renewable resources and a ravaged earth. As the dominos topple, they symbolize both rejection and depletion of such resource use.
These three games were selected for their visual, auditory, and kinesthetic impact. Using three different communication modes improves retention of the installation’s message.