Cyber-Juggling: James Jay's Juggling Jukebox !

BY PETER D. MARK

 

Ever since Shelley's Frankenstein, the idea of fusing flesh and technology has fascinated scientists and the general public alike.

 

In 1960, two scientists, Manfred Clynes and Nathan Kline, coined the term

"cyborg" (short for cybernetic organism) in a paper entitled "Psychophysiological Aspects of Space Flight" in which they argued that a "self-regulating man-machine system" (a cyborg) might be essential for survival in extraterrestrial environments.

        

Since then, cyborgian images have infused popular culture: comic books (X-Men), TV shows (Six Million Dollar Man), films (Robocob, Johnny Nmemonic), and countless works of science fiction. The phenomenon is so pervasive that a vast compendium entitled "The Cyborg Handbook" (edited by Chris Hables Gray) has recently appeared that catalogues these and other matters cyborgian. As exhaustive as this 540-page tome is, it's missing an entry: the Juggling Jukebox.

 

The Juggling Jukebox is the embodiment of a vision of James Jay, a Seattle sculptor, graphic artist and juggler, and Bret Battey, a Seattle composer. Jay performs two versions of the Jukebox: high-tech and low.

 

The high-tech version is a multimedia mixture of musical sounds, flashing lights and juggling. Performing at large public gatherings such as Bumbershoot, the annual Seattle Arts Festival, Jay stands on a raised platform, clad in black, tilted forward, motionless and expressionless, until a viewer (often a child) inserts money into the coin/bill acceptor on the adjacent hand-built "vending" machine and pushes a button to select a "song." The "user" can choose from a list of eight songs with such titles as "Water Clock," "Ionic Collonade," and "Astrolabe #7" with a corresponding list of price options: $1I for a three-ball routine, $2 for four balls, and $5 for five balls. (The low­tech version offers additional choices: 25 cents for one ball, 50 cents for two balls, and $99 for seven balls. Jay actually can do seven balls, but so far no one has taken him up on it.)