Recreational Bombs; Milan = Boom

Over recent decades, entertainment and play have become decoupled from actual jeopardy, whilst simultaneously our consumption of risk via news and documentary footage has become more realistic. Recreational Bombs is an attempt to develop tension and anxiety: emotions that elevate our engagement within an entertainment topology. The project has been imagined as a series of scaled, contextually specific events, which all involve the design and construction of an explosive device. The device is activated, disarmed and (potentially) detonated, with participants receiving a photographic or filmic souvenir of their moment of truth. The experience is also conceived as a boundary test in taste: At what point does the consumption of violence as entertainment become unacceptable? At the heart of the project lies an ethical questioning of the contemporary consumption, glorification and fetishisation of modern warfare, weaponry, violence and crime.

MILAN=BOOM can be seen as one manifestation of the over-arching Recreational Bombs project. MILAN=BOOM was essentially an installation – an experience prototype – which took place in Milan Design Fair during 2012. DWFE designed and constructed an environment using a small network of tunnels, through which participants crawled in order to reach a timed explosive device. Upon reaching their target, these amateur disarmers were faced with a straightforward choice: Whether to cut the red wire, or the green wire. As the digital display counted down the seconds to detonation, each person found themselves at the centre of a familiarly clichéd scenario, and a camera was positioned to capture their ‘hero moment’.