Marking the first multi-sculpture installation using ARW's Inflatable Bodies technology, the Birds contemplates the life cycle through a study of movement, image, scale, and sound. Sixteen large, white fabric shapes that recall the simplest line drawing of a bird, or the shriveled remains of a bat limp and lifeless, or even remains of a ribbed structure eroded with time. As viewers enter the room, the shriveled lifeless forms gradually inflate with air and lengthen and gain shape, and eventually become tapered cone-shaped forms reaching out in a graceful robust wingspan.

The pattern of the birds for the first installation was influenced by a flight into Adelaide, Australia. The River Murray is beautiful in its curving shape, but a river that is now dying because of the overdevelopment surrounding it. The Birds in the Adelaide installation flew in a line that traces the shape drawn by the River Murray upon the earth. The vantage point places the viewer at eye level with the installation, moving through the installation allows you find various compositions reminiscent of the formations of nature.

Their stationary journey: a slow, elegant flapping motion is generated by Servo-controlled air bladders animating the forms. The sequence of multiple actions creates a constant rhythmic breathing sound. After a brief flight, the birds reach the end of their life, and begin a deflating collapse that starts at the tip and moves inward to the center of the body.