Project Proposal: A sniff of culture
This project came to my mind because of a previous experience in a kids museum, in this museum the exhibition consisted in tubes that had different smells. The kids where supposed to relate the smell and the thing that emitted that smell.
Adding to this, the idea of cultural identity and how to express different cultures in an exposition, helped mold a new idea. The concept of using smell to relate to a culture sounded fascinating, yet not complete. For that reason the project will also incorporate sound, and a video to express the feelings, memories and culture that one particular smell signifies to someone.
I have though on presenting a video of someone originally from the country the plate comes from, and for him to explain through a video the significance of the smell. This will connect people with cultures and people outside of our comfort zones. It will help people interact with different cultures and traditions, through their senses.
For the project I have planned on using a sensor of distance, to identify when a person is sniffing the certain smell tube of a specific country. When the arduino identifies it, then send a signal to the processing to play the video of the person of that country. And furthermore, play some background music related to their culture.