Before automated, electric measuring units became widespread, the local observations of the Budapest centre of the meteorology services were made with various devices in the Petrezselyem Street observatory garden. These devices were placed in white, wooden enclosures called Stevenson screens or instrument shelters for weather protection. My installation titled Observatory Garden consists of three classical instrument shelters, but inside them,
instead of measuring devices, an artificial storm rages, generated by various sources of light and sound, as well as effect machines. It is as if the instruments of measurement became the source of the storm and the measurement itself caused the change. Our attention is therefore drawn to the impact of observation itself on the system being observed and the subjectivity of perception: the inner mechanisms are fully detached from the outer world, just as we are often guided by our beliefs and expectations. When we reduce the highly complex and chaotic atmospheric processes to 'good' or 'bad' weather, our visceral desire for order and security is revealed, and the need for accurate prediction reflects our universal wish to foresee the future. If we feel we have no control over our circumstances and have no idea what is coming, one thing we can change is our attitude to unpredictability.