A Thousand Drones Will Fly Over New York City At Once This Weekend | CPT PPP Coverage

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“Franchise Freedom,” an aerial drone dance that’s been performed at NASA and Burning Man, will send 1,000 autonomous machines skyward in Manhattan on Saturday night for a kinetic light show over Central Park. The New York spectacle will be notably larger in scale than past presentations, which typically involved around 300 drones.

Dutch artists Lonneke Gordijn and Ralph Nauta, who call themselves Studio DRIFT and mostly produce experiential installations, say “Franchise Freedom” aims to explore humans’ relationship to nature.

“The artwork is a poetic illustration of how we as humans strive to live autonomously within a society defined by rules and conventions,” the artists say on their website. “Although the drone patterns appear random and the swarm reminds us of freedom, the behavior of these birds is completely orchestrated and subject to many rules and survival instincts.”

Three free shows in Central Park on Saturday start at 7 p.m., 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. and last for 10 minutes each. A map on the DRIFT website lists the best spots for viewing the light-bearing drones forming synchronous patterns in the sky. DRIFT will also livestream the performance, with musical accompaniment by Dutch composer and pianist Joep Beving that online viewers can access through services including Spotify, Apple Music and Amazon Music.

To create “Franchise Freedom,” DRIFT outfitted drones with custom software programmed based on research into starling flight behavior.

No one just shows up and flies 1,000 unmanned aircraft over a city of millions, of course—at least not without major repercussions. The Central Park performance has been in the works for five years, according to ArtNews, due to regulations on drone flying in New York City dating back to 2017. The artists finally got permission to mount their display in Central Park after the announcement, in July, of new rules governing take-off and landing permits for unmanned aircraft, including drones.

“The permit process considers the requirements of federal, state and local laws, and balances the ever-present safety and privacy concerns inherent in widespread use of drones against the important benefits this modern technology offers,” New York City Police Department said when it shared information on the new permitting process.

Drone light shows aren’t new to the skies. They entertain audiences at college campuses and science museums. And sometimes drones even synchronize for a cause. This month, drone maker DJI mounted an elaborate drone light show that called for global water conservation by configuring the flying vehicles into the shape of giant blue water droplets that turned into ripples as they descended.

“Franchise Freedom” debuted at contemporary art fair Art Basel in 2017, and visitors to Art Basel Miami Beach in December were the most recent to watch the public art display. Video from that performance shows multicolored lights illuminate the night sky like huge choreographed fireflies. Sometimes the swirling drones resemble flocks of birds, other times a DNA helix.

Studio DRIFT has mounted other kinetic drone installations as well, including one for a 50th anniversary celebration of Amsterdam’s Van Gogh Museum that ended the event, appropriately, in a truly starry night.