Astonishing Science. Spectacular museum.
© Andreas Schmidt
Location: Digitopolis, second floor Wellcome Wing (no longer on display)
In 2000 Michael Rosen was commissioned to create poems for the Digitopolis gallery. The poems were printed large scale across glass structures in the gallery. The Digitopolis gallery explored the extraordinary ways new technologies change our experience of the world.
Read the poems
Michael Rosen is a broadcaster, children's novelist and poet and the author of 140 books. He was appointed as the fifth Children’s Laureate in June 2007.
The Poems
When Buzz and Woody played our heroes, behind the scenes they are ones and zeros. > So art and imagination became a giant calculation._ A sound engineer with a very sound ear seized the chance to digitally enhance some sound he'd found. > He was so entranced, he danced. On and on he boogied, he bopped, he couldn' stop. > So now when people go walking past his studio they see him in the grip of rhythm spellbound by the sound._ > > > > > > What you hear is what you see, what you see is what you hear. Now the shape is the tune and the tune is the shape. Use the sound that moves you, move the sound that soothes you. You can cut, you can mix you can dub, you can fix. What you see is what you hear What you hear is what you see._ > The screen is the dream. Behind is the mind. > Every spot, every dot we’ve seen on the screen is a code that was stowed. > Behind is the mind. The screen is the dream._ > "Hi! Can't talk! I'm on the bus. Going home? Me too! That's us, nowhere to go but home. Great. Which one are you on? 38? Me too! Where are you? The Angel? No! Me too! You're not at the front, are you? You'll never guess – me too! > Oh there you are... > Hi! Can't talk! I'm on the mobile."_ > I am a robot. I am writing a poem. Poems are about flowers. Poems are about love. Poems are about beautiful things. I am not a flower. I am not in love. I may or may not be beautiful. I am a robot. That is the end of my poem._ > If a computer laughs when the clown gets hit by custard pies, if a computer can't stop itself from telling lies, if a computer wants to be your friend, if a computer likes stories but cries at the end it's not a computer._ >
The screen is the dream. Behind is the mind. > Every spot, every dot we’ve seen on the screen is a code that was stowed. > Behind is the mind. The screen is the dream._ > "Hi! Can't talk! I'm on the bus. Going home? Me too! That's us, nowhere to go but home. Great. Which one are you on? 38? Me too! Where are you? The Angel? No! Me too! You're not at the front, are you? You'll never guess – me too! > Oh there you are... > Hi! Can't talk! I'm on the mobile."_ > I am a robot. I am writing a poem. Poems are about flowers. Poems are about love. Poems are about beautiful things. I am not a flower. I am not in love. I may or may not be beautiful. I am a robot. That is the end of my poem._ > If a computer laughs when the clown gets hit by custard pies, if a computer can't stop itself from telling lies, if a computer wants to be your friend, if a computer likes stories but cries at the end it's not a computer._ >
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