Walter The Waterwise Gardener
Interactive donations box featuring different functions depending on the coin denomination
This Interactive Donations Box, using Walter the Water-Wise Gardener as a “busker”, provides quirky entertainment in exchange for cash donations to the Wanneroo Museum. Walter is an electronically controlled device, providing varying behaviours in response to a donation. The donation box uses the mechanism commonly found in parking ticket machines to trigger simple sound, light and motion. Walter can water his garden with his fibre-optic water hose and grow a patch of dark sprouts, while a bird and a bee chase each other through the night sky. Rick Vermey, Phillip Gamblen and Peter Gee collaborated on this artwork, with Phil designing the mechanical and electronic components, and Peter responsible for the electronic coding that drives Walter’s various functions.
