Plateau’s Dream: Art + Engineering + Fabrication

2026_02

Merging artistic inquiry with scientific precision, “Plateau’s Dream” is the hypnotic artwork by Dr Deirdre Feeney in collaboration with ANFF-SA.

Deirdre is a cross-disciplinary artist and Senior Lecturer at Adelaide University. She is a researcher who explores the materialities of image-making and creates optical image system artworks based on optical histories and contemporary making methods. Plateau’s Dream contains a series of three artworks featuring bespoke lenses and translucent LCD screens. Each system projects a video animation based on colour perception experiments by the 19th-century physicist Joseph Plateau. For this project, Deirdre created speculative re-enactments of Plateau’s experiments using his hand-painted colour discs.

Plateau’s colour experiments explored the concept of persistence of vision, where different wavelengths of light remain on the retina for different durations. For decades, this phenomenon was attributed to how we see moving images, but it is now superseded by contemporary understanding of critical flicker frequency and temporal integration in the brain. Plateau’s experiments, however, remain an important part of moving image and visual perception histories.

To bring her vision to life, Deirdre collaborated with multiple specialists at Adelaide University’s Mawson Lakes campus for design and fabrication including optical physicist Dr Dale Otten and ANFF-SA experts in optics, 3D printing and microfabrication.

Deirdre said "without ANFF-SA’s support, I wouldn’t have been able to bring the project to life. Not only did their exceptional skills in fabrication play a role, but also their ability to communicate with me as a client."

Deirdre expressed that ANFF-SA’s experts were pivotal to the project’s success and “were always respectful of my designs and perspective as an artist, whilst still being able to translate these requirements into novel fabricated forms. I’m extremely thankful to Rodney Pratt, Izak Lorton, Billy Michalatos, Daniel Williams, Brendan Schawl, Sudhakar Sajja and Mark Cherrill.”

The complexities of the project included working with a variety of materials such as brass, aluminium, acrylic and UV resin. It highlighted ANFF-SA’s equipment and technical excellence with fabrication specialists utilising drafting software, CNC machining, manual machining, diamond turning, electrical component design and 3D printing to achieve the three custom artworks.

New ANFF-SA Operations Manager, Rodney Pratt, formerly Mechatronic Engineer with the Materials Engineering Group, said that this project demonstrates the exceptional teamwork and communication across departments at Adelaide University.

“The electronic, optical and mechanical design and fabrication were all performed at Mawson Lakes,” said Rodney. “Having all the expertise in the one place, meant we could meet the tight project timeline.”

Plateau’s Dream was created as part of the Light Source Exhibition where artists explored the role of light, projection, and performance in expanded cinema, held at The Drill Hall Gallery in The Australian National University.

ANFF-SA is a world-class micro and nanofabrication facility providing open access to cutting-edge equipment housed in state-of-the-art facilities with support from world-leading experts.

If you require support or assistance with your project or research, contact us on 08 8302 5226 or visit anff-sa.com