Tubeman

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Tubeman in Pasadena, Texas

A Tubeman ( English for hose man ), including Airdancer (air dancer) or Skydancer (sky dancers) called, is an inflatable doll that either artificially by a fan is added or naturally by the wind in motion. The figures originally developed for the opening ceremony of the 1996 Summer Olympics are now primarily known as advertising media.

Emergence

Two-legged tubeman to Minshall / Gazit

In preparation for the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta , the Trinidadian artist Peter Minshall was commissioned to design the opening ceremony of the major sporting event. Minshall had become known for designing oversized costumes and carnival figures as well as the book Caribbean Festival Arts and had already worked with the IOC for the 1992 Games . An initial idea of ​​abstract hose puppets as a projection surface for pictures had to be discarded after it did not work as planned. So he sketched two hose dolls side by side, brought them together on the torso and apart again over the torso, creating a figure with arms and legs, which he named Tall Boy .

The Israeli environmental artist Doron Gazit , who had already participated in the 1984 Olympic Games, was hired for the technical implementation . Gazit had made a name for itself with the design and production of experimental wind hoses in bright colors. After he had found a motor with the right torque , more than a dozen 18-meter-high, dancing hose figures celebrated their world premiere on July 19, 1996 at the Centennial Olympic Stadium . Gazit's Tubeworks company then began producing his Fly Guys , as he called the characters, and found their first buyers in Microsoft and Sun Microsystems . Because the Fly Guys called numerous imitators on the scene, the artist was forced to protect his intellectual property with a patent , which was confirmed by the relevant US office in 2001. Since then, Gazit has been selling licenses to other manufacturers. However, the patent only includes “dynamic, inflatable objects” that have at least two openings for the air flowing out, for example at the ends of the arms. Peter Minshall, who was not privy to the patent plans, was disappointed in retrospect by his colleague's step, but did not express any financial intentions himself.

There had already been comparable figures with a less strong dance aspect, for example in 1986 at an art exhibition in Zurich .

Designations

The names Tall Boy and Fly Guy , proposed by the inventors Minshall and Gazit , did not catch on. Since the Gazit patent only affects a certain design and the licensees are also free to choose their name, there are many different product names circulating among different manufacturers and sellers of the hose figures. In addition to practical names such as Tube man , Tube guy or Inflatable man , effective advertising names such as Airdancer or Skydancer enjoy a certain popularity and are partly under trademark protection . Sometimes matching are adjectives prefixed, such as in an appearance on the animated series Family Guy (Season 5, Episode 5) in which of Wacky wavy inflatable arm-flailing tube men or - in the German dubbed version - wackelarmigen Wabbel tornado comrades are talking about.

application

Inflatable tubes at the Love Parade 2010
Tubemen as an advertising medium in Seattle

Thanks to their use at certain major events, the funny hose figures developed from a pure art and entertainment object into a popular advertising medium . After the Olympics, they were used on about January 25, 1998 during the Super Bowl XXXII halftime show at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego . A year later they appeared in a simplified form alongside Ricky Martin in his performance of La Copa de la Vida as part of the 1999 Grammy Awards ceremony .

From the turn of the millennium onwards, more and more pussy ("one-legged") figures with faces and smaller arms were produced, which are often used in advertising, especially by used car dealers . Both Doron Gazit and Peter Minshall's production manager had negative comments about this variant of the invention: the former called it "very ugly and unattractive", the latter an "impoverished version of the device". In 2010, the city ​​of Houston sparked a nationwide trend by banning the hose figures from public spaces alongside streamers , whirligigs and various devices that produce light, steam and smoke by ordinance. The city council's decision came under pressure from a citizens' initiative to beautify the cityscape , which argued among other things with the distraction of road users and "visual disorder". Bans like this had a negative effect on the business with the devices, which also suffered from Chinese replicas and had to specialize more and more as a result.

A new application for the devices was found in rural areas of the USA. There tubemen, some meters high, serve as scarecrows , which are marketed under the name Air Ranger . The effectiveness of the devices against the crop damage caused by birds has been investigated in a study since 2012 and, according to many farmers, significantly exceeds that of conventional methods. An Australian indie - video game developer created a fighting game in the style of Mortal Kombat , in which two Tubemen face. The game, titled Inflatality , premiered at PAX Australia in November 2016 and went on sale in the first quarter of 2017.

reception

Not least because of the controversy over bans and broad reception in popular culture , the hose figures achieved a certain cult status. Their use in shopping malls, parties, festivals, and other events makes them almost omnipresent, especially in the United States. In 2014 radio maker Roman Mars dedicated an episode of his podcast 99% Invisible to the inflatable males . Depending on the taste of the viewer, they are either full of "ridiculous, joyful exuberance or the most kitschy thing in the world". Even in the intro to the show, Mars and his co-producer provided an apt description of the "inflatable men":

“Their wacky faces hover over us, and then fall down to meet us, and then rise up again. Their bodies flop. They flail. They are men. Men made of tubes. Tubes full of air. "

“Their quirky faces hover over us, fall towards us and rise again. Their bodies flop. They lash out wildly. They are men. Men made of hoses. Hoses full of air. "

- Sam Greenspan, Roman Mars (2014)

Web links

Commons : Airdancers  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Roman Mars : 99% Invisible - Episode 143: Inflatable Men. 99% Invisible, February 12, 2014, accessed on March 3, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Shereen Ali: Who knew Minshall invented - Inflatable men? Trinidad & Tobago Guardian , December 10, 2014, accessed March 3, 2020 .
  3. ↑ a b c d e f Sam Dean: Biography of an Inflatable Tube Guy. Medium, October 20, 2014, accessed March 3, 2020 .
  4. ^ Apparatus and method for providing inflated undulating figures. Justia Patents, January 16, 2001, accessed March 3, 2020 .
  5. ^ Video workshop Zurich: Switzerland in Motion 1986. In: Swiss Social Archives . Online , accessed March 25, 2020.
  6. ^ Morgan Kinney: Those Inflatable Tube Men That You See in Front of Houston Businesses Are Illegal. Why? Houstonia, December 4, 2017, accessed March 3, 2020 .
  7. ^ Conor Riordan: Wacky Waving Inflatable Tube Guy. History and Uses. Running Press (RP Minis), Philadelphia 2018, ISBN 978-0762462872 , p. 14 (English).
  8. ↑ Claire Reilly: Tube man death match: An indie game 'so stupid' it works. CNET, November 6, 2016, accessed March 3, 2020 .