GALAXY, part 7

[The GALAXY Project is a light-art installation that I’m working on for the next burn. Phase I is essentially a spiral labyrinth made of hundreds of glowing rings made of EL.]

I wanted to see if the sizes of rings I’d been imagining to be appropriate were. My original impulse was to have four sizes ranging from 8” to 18”, but I decided to simplify to three sizes: 9”, 12”, and 15”.

First step was to draw the circles. I had a trash can with a 9” diameter, but the two larger sizes proved impossible to match. (I could have gotten close, I suppose, but for some reason I was focused on accuracy.)

So I went back to my middle school geometry skills. Remember string art?

You will notice that my first attempt (in black ink) was a misfire. So much for middle school memory. But I corrected myself and tediously drew all the lines for my two larger circles. Could I have perhaps found a compass that could have handled radii of 6” and 7.5”? Like, don’t I own one, somewhere? Probably, but I’M IN QUARANTINE — why not draw dozens of lines that I’m just going to cut away and discard?

The three sizes of circle:

(The green lead is attached to the Assistive Feline™, who was communing with the chipmunks over in the ferns.)

Another angle:

So yes, these three sizes will be perfectly cromulent.

It occurred to me that since my labyrinth is 32’ across, I should be able to set up and test Phase I there, and once Phase I is complete, I can use those rings to layout/design Phases II & III. (I am still unclear as how I’m going to structure the blobs to provide clear paths but at the same time allow wandering through them.)