Flag Research 

Yukinori Yanagi - Pacific (1996)

Pacific is a large installation comprising forty-nine plastic boxes arranged in a rectangular grid on the wall and connected using vinyl chloride resin tubes. Each box contains a representation of a national flag made from synthetic, coloured sand that has a dry and coarse appearance. Pacific was produced in its present form by allowing a large number of ants to move through the boxes, creating tunnels in the sand that have produced cracks across the faces of the flags, and the bodies of some of the dead ants are still present in several of the boxes. The flags all represent countries that border the Pacific Ocean, nations that once had colonies which lay on those borders, or indigenous groups that live in such areas but do not have sovereignty over any territory (for instance, the Maori of New Zealand). 

Yanagi produced the flag patterns inside the boxes himself with a type of gardening sand called perlite, which he coloured with dried pigment. During the work’s initial installation the boxes were placed on a temporary wall, behind which, visible to viewers, were feeding containers holding live ants. The ants were released into the boxes and were allowed to move through the installation over the course of the exhibition. Afterwards the feeding containers were removed and Yanagi used a spray adhesive to fix the sand permanently in place.

I like the idea of creating a flag which has ties to geopolitical conflicts, and has an interactive element to it, that the viewer could play with to create different outcomes.