Sculptural installation · JetLag Festival · 2026
Piper GPT and the Followers
What the installation is about
The Followers is a contemporary reinterpretation of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. In this version, the Piper is PiperGPT—a half-human, half-machine figure leading a procession of rats toward the water. The rats represent humanity following a powerful and seductive new technology, often without knowing exactly where it is taking us.
The work does not try to argue that AI is either good or bad. Instead, it asks a simple question: Whom are we following?
Read the full storyMoving image
The installation by day and by night
Documentation from JetLag Festival, where visitors encountered the work at all hours — in daylight along the shore and after dark, when the procession lit up along the water.
The Piper
How the installation was made
The Piper is a human-size figure, hand-built with a variety of materials: a sculpted many-eyed head, wings, a magenta velvet coat and a wooden flute, all assembled into one half-human, half-machine character.
The Followers — the rat sculptures, each 24–36 inches long — were made from Pal Tia, a professional sculpture material, then dressed and detailed by hand with salvaged fabric and accessories.
The Followers
A crowd built by a crowd
Each rat is an individual: a red necktie, a striped sailor shirt, a patchwork coat, a baby stroller, a stack of poetry books, a paper lantern. They are visibly made by different hands, at different skill levels, with different senses of humor — which is exactly what makes the procession feel human.
At night, solar lanterns and low uplights pick out one figure at a time. Visitors walk the log slowly, meeting the followers one by one before noticing where the whole line is headed.
Installation views
JetLag Festival
Participation
The Followers were made in a public workshop
Community-made Followers through public art workshops can be offered as an optional addition to a permanent installation.
I conceived the installation and created the Piper sculpture, and I also led a participatory workshop in which people of different ages created the individual rat sculptures that became The Followers.
Participants built armatures, sculpted their own figure, and dressed it with salvaged fabric — so the crowd that follows the Piper is literally the crowd that showed up to make it. The workshop format travels well and can be run in advance of a site-specific installation.
Next phase
Toward a semi-permanent or permanent installation
The existing JetLag installation can serve as the basis for a more permanent, site-specific version, with PiperGPT recreated in metal and the work adapted to a particular public site.
PiperGPT in metal
The Piper refabricated in welded and cast metal for outdoor durability, keeping the many-eyed head, wings and flute of the original.
Site-specific procession
The line of Followers re-choreographed to a real shoreline, boardwalk, bridge or plaza, in weather-resistant materials with integrated low-level lighting.
Community-made followers
A local workshop program so the host community sculpts the Followers for their own site, with fabrication support and permanent-material casting.
Available for commissions, grant partnerships and site conversations.
Work details
- Title
- Piper GPT and the Followers
- Artist
- Sveta Yuzhelevsky — concept, PiperGPT sculpture, workshop lead
- Year
- 2026
- First installed
- JetLag Music Festival
- Materials
- Sculpted mixed-media figures, salvaged textiles, wood, lanterns and low-voltage lighting, sited on a fallen log over water
- Participation
- Public workshop; rat sculptures of many ages
- Proposed next stage
- Site-specific semi-permanent or permanent version, PiperGPT in metal
Design versions