Honk If You Like This Piece

Honk If You Like This Piece from Andrew Brase on Vimeo.

Honk is a piece I actually built towards the end of high school, inspired by a friend’s father who built a portable sun-in-a-box consisting of an ammo box, battery and a halogen car headlight. I decided to build an audio version of this in a similar vein, using an ammo box, lawn mower battery, telegraph switch and, of course, a car horn.

Initially built for the hell of it, Honk made the trip with me to college and has been used at parties, waking up freshmen during orientation and as of recent, gallery exhibitions.

While I did not have the forethought as a teenager to put any concept into Honk other than ‘I wanna carry around something really loud’, when the opportunity came to place the piece in a gallery I realized a new intent. One thing I encourage both in my design and art work is interaction. I’m drawn to artwork that incorporates multiple senses, I want to experience a piece on as many fronts as possible.

So with Honk I wanted to tempt the audience. I wanted to supply them with a mysterious (possibly dangerous) looking box with a big fat button on it and I wanted to challenge them to press it. Those that were brave enough to actually make contact with the piece were rewarded with a subtle car horn blast and stares from everyone else in the gallery.