SOLAR WIND WEAVING SUN AND MOON
Nina Sobell and Anne Bean

A Synchronous EEG Seance Performance
One Hour Before the Total Eclipse   August 11, 1999
between two locations: Chateau de Sacy, Sacy le-Petit, France
and the Arts Catalyst boats, Channel Islands

For one hour before the eclipse of the sun at the Chateau de Sacy, Nina Sobell and musician Anders Mansson, connected by an electro-encephalograph (EEG) displaying the synchronicity of their brain waves, made one-minute drawings every five minutes.

This web seance* occurred simultaneously with artist Anne Bean, and participants on the Art Catalyst boats in the English Channel, as they concentrated on thoughts of each other and the impending drama as it drew near.

The project was an attempt to join physically distant people in a celebration of shared collective experience using the Internet as a global nervous system. About 35 participants at each site were present to witness this event of non-verbal communication.

"As we pass out of the shadow," Bill Meyers said, "we will know the profound experience people, birds, and animals will have just moments later--in Eastern Europe then elsewhere on the globe. By experience alone we will be closely connected to others.

The timeline above accesses these drawings in two five minute increments, minute five and minute ten, etc. The two drawings on the left are from the Chateau and the two on the right are from the boats. The writing below each picture on the left is a poem by Ezra Rubenstein, reflecting our 'ground' experience, and on the right are comments by participants at sea.

For the duration of the piece at the Chateau, we listened to Anders Mansson's piano performance of Galina Ustvolskaya's Sonata no. 1 (1947), Sonata no. 2 (1957), Sonata no. 4 (1986), Sonata no. 6 (1988); and Alexander Scriabin's Prelude op. 11 no. 2 Allegretto, Prelude op. 11 no. 4 Lento, Prelude op. 11 no 14 Presto, Prelude op. 11 no. 15 Lento, Sonata no. 9 op. 68.

*For other web seance works  Web Seance: Brainwave Drawings