Painting Mills

March the 4th 2023
20:00h

"Painting mills" was an interactive installation that took place in San Juan mill at Oromana Park of Alcalá de Guadaíra, Seville, the 4th of March 2023.

The creative concept of this installation was marked by my own artistic career. Having trained in an environment dominated by the landscape painting tradition of Alcalá de Guadaira and having the mills as a reference in my youth, I once proposed the possibility of painting one of the mills in pink. More than anything it was an attempt to break with the established and as a symbol of "opening new references in local art".

At that time, obviously and due to various circumstances, including patrimonial conservation, this proposal was not accepted and was forgotten.

Twenty years after I left the city to come to Brussels, and with the advancement of new technologies, I proposed this installation, which aimed to create a dialogue between a tradition and the new means of expression that new technologies bring. The idea was to invite local artists and the general public to paint the San Juan mill, something that was made possible thanks to a projection on all surfaces of the mill. Of course, this installation occurred at night.

Description of the interaction

"Painting mills" is an interactive installation in which local artists and the general public are invited to draw on a 3D model of the mill. That drawing is projected at the same time on the same mill through a mapped projection. To make it possible, this project consists of the following main elements:

User interface: It would be a drawing screen (WACOM) in which, through an application, a 3D reproduction of the mill is presented. It comes with a series of tools (pencil, brush, color picker, etc.). The application can be manipulated from a digital pen, which permits to draw easier. This screen can be installed on a support that allows logos, titles and an explanatory brochure to be placed. For this we are studying how to create a piece of furniture or a type of personalized table. This interface would be placed in front of the mill, so that people can see the mill while drawing. On this screen, the user can draw on the surface of the mill, on all its faces except on the roofs, where the tiled texture is maintained. Once the drawing is finished, the user clicks on a launch button. At that moment the system asks the user for his name. In this way the name of the artist is projected first and then the drawing. The pictures and names appear and disappear with a transition effect, accompanied by a sound.

The inserted drawings are stored in a folder and are projected randomly in a loop while users draw their drawings. We hope to give about 30s to each drawing and from there it goes to the next one. The moment someone inserts a new one, then it appears directly in the projection and after that, it goes back to the loop.

Mapped projection: Through the use of several projectors, all faces of the mill will be covered except the roof. The projection occurs randomly, taking the drawings of all the faces designed in the 3D model. As a complement to the projection, we considered the insertion of a sound system to include looped ambient sound and some sound effects in the transitions.

Collaboration of local artists: we share the app with local artists, which will allow them to make some drawings during the next months and to be projected at the beginning of the event as a framework for the dialogue between landscape painting and new media.

Participant artists


Guillermo Bermudo	Rafael Cerdá	Gloria Martín	Ramón David Morales

Santi Castillo	Sara Castillo	Máximo Jiménez	Diego Montes

Pierina Montiglio	Ángeles Martínez	Inma Otero	Cristina Díaz

Claudio Cortés	Granada Arias	Miguel Domínguez	Marta Calvo

Miguel A Márquez Pérez	Beatriz Heredia	Miguel A Márquez	K.A.L.E.

Felipe Loza	David Serrano	Daniel Bartual