For the 2011 timelapse video (above), one shot was taken about every 3½ minutes, from May 29th, 2011 at 1:16pm to June 12th, 2011 at 9:36am (approx. 2 weeks). Shot in Toronto during the exhibition 'Stop. Look. Listen.' at Harbourfront Centre, curated by Pat Macaulay. Video shot with a Canon PowerShot camera running CHDK and Andrew Hazelden's intervalometer script. Thanks for the help Andrew!

The 2008 timelapse video (above) covers over an approximately 48 hour period. It shows the first version of Leak to Lower Lazy Levitating Load in the exhibition Lazymode at Oboro in Montréal in spring 2008.

There have been several revisions. Most notably, the water tower was constructed in Spring 2010 for the exhibition Process As Paradigm at Laboral in Gijón, Spain (photos below, click for high res).

More description below.

photo: Marcos Morilla, click for hi res

photo: Marcos Morilla, click for hi res

'Water seeks the low places'
-Leonardo da Vinci

This is a 'levitating' machine.

A black 55-gallon drum is suspended from the ceiling. It is full of water and rest on the floor. An identical barrel sits on top of a 7 foot tall tower.

The hanging barrel is gradually lifted as a small pump sips away at the water, moving it up to the tower. When the vessel is raised to a height equal to its own, the pump stops. An electric leak valve opens, and gravity makes the water trickles back down from the tower, lowering the barrel to its initial position. The cycle repeats.

The system is solar-powered, and is therefore intermittent, depending on the weather. Things move at a lethargic pace. It may take days or weeks for levitation to occur.

Small things can work to eventually act upon forces larger than they. This is how trees work: many small pumps slowly move masses of water from the ground up to the top leaves of the tree. A tree moves many times its own weight in water over its lifetime.