progress update

Having returned from the offline world of Burning Man, I'm working not only on this project but on an unrelated talk I'll be giving at TEDxMidAtlantic next Friday, so my documentation may suffer. Since returning I've sketched plans for the frame that will hold the solar vacuum tubes at an angle in the sunlight and a holder for the one I'll be using in the tea space. With significant help from a friend with a drill press and saber saw, I now have five large bamboo tubes with window cutouts for the vacuum tubes and holes to mount them on the frame, plus one large plain bamboo tube for in the tea space.

On the electronics front, I've confirmed that I can wire up multiple waterproof temperature sensors to the Arduino and read their respective temperatures; I've also confirmed that I can display words on a little 16x2 LCD display. I've got a stacking prototyping shield so that I can neatly combine these parts. In a couple of days I'll have a tiny breadboard to stick on that shield and try wiring up everything at the same time.

naka-ita finished!

creating personal space

Japanese tea rooms can be various sizes, which are expressed in terms of the number of tatami mats that comprise them. To keep my mobile tea setup physically manageable, I decided I'd go with a simple, small, two-tatami mat space—one mat for the host, and one mat for the guest(s). Having made tea for friends before with a two-mat setup, though, I've found that personal space becomes a challenge. I've never had tea class in such a small space, so I've never seen an authoritative solution, but the problem in a small space is the lack of what I'll call neutral territory. The distinction between space that is inside the tatami border (relative to the guest or host) and the space that is outside that border is important. The space inside the border is basically your personal space. When there is no 'neutral territory' that is outside both the host's and the guest's personal space, the act of placing something like a tea bowl outside your space—as the host would do to serve tea to a guest or a guest would do to examine the bowl—becomes the act of placing something inside someone else's personal space. Which as far as I've seen is not done, except marginally between guests. It feels invasive.

An attractive architectural solution is for the tea space to include a naka-ita (literally "middle board") between the host's mat and the guests' mat. This board provides neutral territory, so a host can serve a bowl of tea without putting it inside the guest's personal space, a guest can examine or return utensils outside the tatami border without putting those utensils on the host's mat, and the guests can pass a tray of sweets amongst themselves without impinging on each other's or the host's personal space.

This is a long-winded explanation of why I'm undertaking the project of making a naka-ita, which will be useful not only for this tenriki-no-cha project but generally anytime I want to serve tea with a two-mat setup. I found some beautiful cherry boards at the Woodworkers Club store; since none of them was wide enough, I joined three of them with glue and clamps. I'm currently in the sand-and-apply-finish loop, so I'm getting to know the nuances of this piece of wood intimately. Even on a surface that looks and feels smooth and level, sanding after applying finish reveals subtle variations in the surface, whether brought about through the natural growth of the tree or through the planing process at the wood shop. I'm guessing that I'll be 'done' once enough finish has accumulated and/or raised the wood grain such that sanding no longer reveals new surface variation. If you're a woodworker, your input is more than welcome.

I'll rub on a finishing wax afterward and, since the inch-thick board is not quite half the thickness of a tatami mat, create a (styrofoam?) underlayer to bring the board level with the surface of the tatami mats.

Project Submitted to Figment DC

I have submitted the application for this project to be included in Figment DC, an annual participatory art festival that will take place this year on September 26 and 27 in Anacostia Park. I first attended Figment DC as a member of the public in 2013, returning in 2014 as a day(s)-of volunteer.

If development of 天力の茶 proceeds as I hope, I plan to apply for it to be included in Figment Pittsburgh on October 4.

Chelsea Dobert-Kehn's "Tea Time" at Figment DC 2013

Why this is a web site even?

Greetings, interested reader! I admit it's a little silly to create an entire web site with its own domain for a little amateur art+science project that I've barely started. I got the idea when I saw that the Figment DC project submission form had an optional field for Project URL and decided then and there that 天力の茶 would be a thing of its own. A thing that wouldn't be for just one event and confined to the mind and sparse notes of one person, but a thing that I'd develop and muse on in the open, that would grow and transform over time based on feedback from guests, observers, near and distant chajin, and anyone else who has a thought to offer. Welcome and よろしくお願いします.