My second project started out with the idea of combining science with dream and delirium, partly due to the history of the structure of benzene, which came to Kekule in a dream. Originally I wanted an artistic representation of the scientific side of dream and delirium. For over 3 years I have wanted to do a project with ferrofluid, and I decided to fulfil my dream of doing so with this project.
Ferrofluid is a liquid collodial suspension of magnetite particles, and in the presence of a magnetic field it 'spikes' up with the magnetic flux lines. My idea was to use an oscillating electromagnet to create a sort of organic sculpture that pulsed into its 'spiked' form and fell back into a puddle of liquid. I needed a power source, an electromagnet, and a circuit that pulsed power to the electromagnet.
One insomniac night I was laying in bed wondering how I was ever going to relate this project to the class material, and I was playing around with various thoughts of calling it 'dream-fluid' or some other nonsense. I continued making up some elaborate back-story about the fluid, jokingly, at first, but then it developed into my project idea. I would trick the class!
At this point my project shifted from the technical side of creating this dynamic sculpture to efforts to make up convincing documentation. I was 'taking a risk', as we were encouraged to do. My project became the presentation itself, with a little bit of acting, a bit of made-up documentation, and a story about scientific research that never existed.
So here's the idea: While searching online for ideas regarding dreams that you're flying, I came across a message board where one user mentioned some studies two German scientists (Friedrich Koppen and Franz Muller) had carried out in the eary '90s involving flight dreams. They would train their volunteers to be able to lucid dream, and then once they were lucid dreaming, they were asked to dream they were flying. The scientists monitored their REM sleep, and would wake them up while they were believed to be dreaming that they're flying. A sample of blood would be drawn if they had indeed had a flight dream, and the blood was analyzed. What they found was that that feeling that you're floating or flying when you sleep isn't just a neurochemical thing, but rather a physiological response to a chemical your body produces when you dream you're flying. It's this chemical in your blood that makes you feel weightless. But, this chemical is reabsorbed into the body very quickly, with a half-life of only about 6.5 minutes. Therefore it was necessary to draw the blood right after you woke up.
Since I have always had more frequent flight dreams than my peers (maybe 4 morning a week I wake up with them), I seemed to be the perfect test subject. I figured the procedure behind their experiment was simple enough, so I decided to try it myself. I drew blood for two weeks beginning on Spring Break, and recorded the time and amount drawn each time. I already knew how to draw my own blood due to some 'unfortunate medical experiences in my past'. I stored the blood in my dorm room's mini-fridge, much to the displeasure of my roommate. Every week I have Organic Chemistry lab, so I brought the blood in and spun it in the lab's centrifuge and pulled off the plasma and red blood cells. What I was left with was some black-ish motor oil-looking liquid which exhibited some strange properties...
During my presentation I pulled out a small vial of this dark liquid, put on some latex lab gloves, and pipetted a few drops onto the apparatus I brought in and set up. I then turned on the power and the liquid began to pulse into its spiked shape...
Of course all of this was completely made up. The real project was composed of all the little details and anecdotes that contributed to a convincing story. Pictures showed bruised arms (which I actually had, but due to actual blood draws from my doctor), 'blood' in my fridge (which was actually corn syrup and food dye), the centrifuge from lab (which probably never even worked), and my chart where I 'recorded' blood draw times and amounts. It was a good exercise in deception, and I was scared to death about being able to pull it off. I had doubts of whether or not my class would believe me, but they fell for it, and it worked out better than I could have hoped!
