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The Fog rolls in; the Fire Department responds
By adamg on Sat, 08/11/2018 - 5:25pm
The Emerald Necklace Conservancy yesterday turned on Fujiko Nakaya's Fog x FLO fog displays at several locations, from Jamaica Pond to the Back Bay Fens. Clay Harper visited several of the locations today.
Vasant Marur visited the Fens location - and watched BFD roll up after somebody reported the "fog" as a fire (to be fair, the Fens do have a rep for catching on fire fairly easily):
#FogxFLO #Boston doesn't know how to have fun or appreciate art... Beautiful art installation that opened today in the #Fens but someone called Boston Fire.. pic.twitter.com/SltfbSQkDH
— Vasant Marur (@vasantmarur) August 11, 2018
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Comments
At least #Boston does its job
At least #Boston does its job in emergencies. Clearly somebody called BFD, they don’t just show up on their own.
Smh. People find the dumbest things to complain about.
Hey remember when there was a
Hey remember when there was a swat team shut down over those LED” mooninite” installations at Sullivan sq?
I'm glad someone called the fire department
I completely disagree with twitter guy Vasant Marur. I'm a Boston native, love fun, love art and come from a family of artists. But if I saw this smoke I probably would have called the fire department. Just because some people knew what it was doesn't mean everyone knew. My guess is that many people called, and that is a good thing.
This is similar to the Aqua Teen devices that caused a bomb scare a few years ago. Not everyone is in on one persons art or one company's marketing campaign, and if they appear to be something dangerous, a call to 911 is to be expected. An electronic device stuck to infrastructure is suspicious and should be investigated.
It's not smoke
...and it's really unlikely to be smoke from a brushfire after a solid month of rain.
The Aqua Teen incident was an
The Aqua Teen incident was an embarrassing over reaction. The city was rightfully mocked for it. Other cities had the Aqua Teen installations and didn't freak out and waste resources. The fog installations have signs near them explaining what they are so no one should be calling 911.
Calling from a distance?
All I can think of is that the person who called 911 saw the steam rising from a distance and took it for smoke. My first thought had also been that one ought to be able to smell/feel the difference between steam and smoke pretty easily, but perhaps our see-something-say-something friend was too far away to tell.
Did these concerned citizens consider why this "smoke"...
didn't, you know, have a BURNING SMELL to accompany it?!
Boston Fire Dept SOP #1
SOP # 1: Alarms of fire shall be responded to instantaneously, irregardless of all other considerations.
The fog comes on little cat feet.
The fog comes
on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fog_(poem)
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/44212/the-love-song-of-j-alfred-prufrock
Invisible gulls with human
Invisible gulls with human voices cry in the sea-cloud
'There is room, wild minds,
Up high in the cloud; the web and the feather remember
Three elements, but here
Is but one, and the webs and the feathers
Subduing but the one
Are the greater, with strength and to spare.' You dream, wild
criers,
The peace that all life
Dreams gluttonously, the infinite self that has eaten
Environment, and lives
Alone, unencroached on, perfectly gorged, one God.
Caesar and Napoleon
Visibly acting their dream of that solitude, Christ and Gautama,
Being God, devouring
The world with atonement for God's sake . . . ah sacred hungers,
The conqueror's, the prophet's,
The lover's, the hunger of the sea-beaks, slaves of the last peace,
Worshippers of oneness.
KALUMPATHMUPABUMPATUMPABUMP!
Husband: WTH was that???
Me: That was the the fog stealing in
Not Art
n/t
Update Sunday Morning
I'm not in the Fenway, but here in Dorchester there's some REAL genuine scary fog this morning. Visibility is about 100 feet here in Fields Corner
Call me a fuddyduddy
What materials are used in creating the "fog"? Are they hazardous to flora or fauna? Do they contaminate air, water or ground?
How is this different from graffiti?
Why wasn't BFD notified of an environmental obstruction/condition prior to the release of the fumes?
This attempt at art imitating nature seems juvenile and of the thoughtless school, "just because I can, I will".
Not impressed. I do like fog, though, a la Edward Gorey's "atmosphere". A little sinister, a little levity, with a little levitation thrown in for good measure.
You're a fuddyduddy
"Release of the fumes"? The artwork is made of water.
http://www.wbur.org/artery/2018/08/10/fujiko-nakaya-fog-boston-emerald-n...
Anyone complaining that this
Anyone complaining that this fog is potentially dangerous is an awesome mark for this old hoax.
"How is this different from
"How is this different from graffiti?"
Permission, basically. Beyond arguing what is or isn't art (because that becomes a whole bigger conversation on who has the authority to decide what is or isn't art), you can basically decide graffiti vs not graffiti on whether or not the person has permission to install/paint/create there. Fujiko Nakaya has permission from the Emerald Necklace Conservancy, so it's not graffiti.