Interactive Re-animation Brings Life to The Dead

Interactive Re-animation Brings Life to The Dead
Cyborgs are taking over the Mendel Art Gallery in Saskatoon this summer.

A new installation called The Uncanny: Experiments in Cyborg Culture features lit up robot heads, pop culture cyborgs and Japanese anime.

One of the strange exhibits features dead frog's legs that jerk in an electrical spasm.

Garnet Hertz calls the piece Experiments in Galvanism: Frog with Implanted Web Server.

The Hertz work also has an interactive element. From a Web site, people can click on an icon to move either of the frog's legs. Custom electronics and motors grafted to the frog's bones animate its legs.

The Saskatoon artist says he was inspired by 18th century experiments using electricity - the same experiments made famous by Mary Shelley in her definitive romance novel Frankenstein.