The Phone Booth

Step into a 1950s phone booth and connect with the past—literally—by talking to an AI emulating da Vinci, Galileo, or other historical minds.

Description: In this interactive art installation, visitors pick up a retro telephone receiver and are greeted with: “This is your operator. To whom may I connect you?” From there, they’re patched through to a simulated historical figure—Leonardo da Vinci, Ada Lovelace, Nikola Tesla—brought to life by ChatGPT and voice synthesis.

The installation uses a Raspberry Pi, audio routing, and customized scripts to create a seamless speech-to-speech dialogue experience. The goal is not just to entertain, but to provoke curiosity, wonder, and reflection on history, legacy, and the future of consciousness. Each interaction becomes a moment of time-travel intimacy, where the boundary between the living and the remembered blurs into performance, memory, and imagination.

Call to Action:
Interested in tech-meets-history installations? We’re assembling a team of volunteers to help with voice testing, AI tuning, sound design, historical character selection, and user experience setup. If you love retro tech, time travel, or education through play—get involved.