Weather Cart, 2009.
Operational weather instruments include; aeronometer, weather vein, precipitation gauge, thermometer, barometer, and hygrometer.
Found materials from Connecticut forest.
42” by 60” by 64”

Constructed for I-Park Environmental Art Residency and Biennial, East Haddam Connecticut.

The operating Weather Cart is constructed of found natural materials from the I - Park fields and woods plus one found mason jar. On the cart and inside the cart (there is a door on top one may open), there are several instruments crudely interpreted but still functionable. Included are the weather vein (wind direction), a small and large aeronometer (wind speed), and a precipitation gauge. Inside the cart and protected from the elements are the thermometer, barometer (atmospheric pressure), and hygrometer (relative humidity).

Over a two week span I recorded data and learned insight into the local Connecticut weather patterns for June, as wet as it was, while also testing the instruments. By this September probably only the precipitation gauge and the hygrometer remain reliable. The barometer and thermometer require constant recalibrating, while the other instruments will be subseptable to the elements. The fragility and intended entropy of the weather cart contrasts our modern dependence on science, technology, and man-made materials. Utilizing ‘extreme measures’ resourcefulness of Natural materials maintained the ability to accurately investigate the atmospheric and flora changes of the surroundings of I - Park. To investigate the world around us is to investigate ourselves.

  
Wind instruments and precipitation gauge

  
Other instruments protected from elements inside cart

Hygrometer, thermometer and barometer

Instrument descriptions:

Weather vein - bark sewn on stick with grass

Aeronometers - feathers and wood (small), birch bark sewn on branches with grass (larger)

Precipitation gauge - birch branch hollowed out with pins for water levels, sealed with wax

Thermometer - birch branch hollowed out with slider inside, sealed with wax, contains water that as it heats and expands, pushes the slider up through the cylinder, (like a tire gauge), the warmer the slider will stick out higher.

Barometer - mason jar on a branch that has been hollowed out, also includes a slider, that reaches up into the inverted mason jar. The jar keeps the pressure constant while the pressure around changes, the slider rises up or down in the cylinder sealed by a shallow dish of water the cylinder rests in.

Hygrometer - human hair is tied at one end to a wood pin, and attached to a small flake of wood with a pebble weight attached with grass to it. The flake of wood is also pined but free to move up or down. When the air is moist the hair expands and the wood flake moves down, as the air becomes drier the hair ‘shrinks’ and the wood flake rises.