Gravity Bike
“This Gravity Bike built by Jeff Tiedeken can reach high speeds when going downhill due to its lightweight design and lack of features like a chain and pedals. The seat is fitted over the rear wheel, and the bike has a low profile, allowing the rider to position themselves like they would on a motorbike.
The minimalistic design features elegant curves, 26-inch Crossmax Lefty wheels, Avid Elixr hydraulic disc brakes and motorbike-style footpeg struts. The bike has reached speeds of 50 mph and is said to have the potential to achieve up to 70 mph.” - PSFK
Auerbach’s RGB Colorspace Atlas
As part of an exhibition with MOMA entitled Ecstatic Alphabets/Heaps of Language, Tauba Auerbach has created a piece that visualises the RGB colour field in three dimensions, not too unlike a psychedelic stack of Post-Its.
“Human eyes typically have three types of colour receptor on their retinas, each sensitive to a different range of wavelengths of light. The colours associated with these wavelengths are approximately red, green, and blue. Because there are three types of colour receptor, it is possible to map the visible spectrum in a three-dimensional spatial model by assigning red, green, and blue each to a dimension. It is then possible to outline a cube in this space, where the values of red (R), green (G), and blue (B) are visible on a gradient scale of 0 to 100% in their respective directions. These gradients combine to create the RGB colour space cube, a volume in which any colour can be located by a set of three coordinates. RGB Colourspace Atlas, both a sculptural object and spatialisation of colour, consists of three books. Each volume contains the entire visible spectrum mapped out over 3,632 pages, representing the RGB cube sliced in a different direction: vertically, horizontally, and from front to back.” - MOMASee the video and more on the work on the MOMA microsite.
Zaha Hadid’s Z Boat
Commissioned by art dealer Kenny Schacter, “The asymmetrical design is sculptural in appearance while practically affording more seating accommodations. In a sense, the bespoke boat is as much a work of art as a Cisitalia sports car in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The idea is to think of vessels and vehicles as highly individualistic expressions of art, architecture and design reflecting the edge of what is possible using the most advanced means, including materials, software systems and methods of fabrication.” - Zaha Hadid
Renaissance man Vibskov
“I’d been doing music for 14 years, and I thought, I need to do something different, I need to do something more.” Renaissance designer, Henrik Vibskov seamlessly unites his disparate artistic practices of artist, musician, fashion and stage designer. He has an eponymous clothing line that is used as the focal point to bring together his ideas, but the fashion is just one aspect of a larger vision of his. His shows are always wild happenings that, in the past, have featured unfurling picnic tables, men pushing mechanical wooden boats, a conceptual transparent garden shed, models walking inside zebra striped hamster wheels, and models walking down the runway on push pedals that activate a wall of drums behind them. These are just some of the fantastical set-ups he has created.
“I like when people are part of something, walking away with a new feeling or a new vision. Imagination to try and do something off track, twisted from daily life….It’s as much about how you present creativity, for example, if you build something, you probably also need music.” - Henrik Vibskov
He has a new book coming out that shows the last 15 years of his work, published by Gestalten.
Get the book HERE.
Ampitheatre Lineage
What are the most epic and memorable structures of human history? You could say churches, mosques, castles, skyscrapers, but one structure that has remained with us is the stadium (ever since we had enough time to be entertained on mass scale). From the Coliseum to the Hippodrome, the stadium is a great monument of human history. In light of this summer’s games, Populous, designer of the London Olympic Stadium has sponsored a new exhibition at London’s Soane Museum that looks at the origin of these venues and how they have evolved. Whether housing gladiator fights, football matches or Beyonce’s local fan base, the legacy of the stadium carries on.
Coolhunting.com: “Stadia: Sport and Vision in Architecture”
100,000 staples make a city
Ephemicropolis (2010) by Peter Root.
100,000 Staples
Approx floor area 600x300cmStacks of staples were broken into varying sizes from full stacks about 12cm high down to single staples. These stacks were then stood up and arranged over a period of 40 hours.
Click here to see feature in March 2012 issue of National Geographic Magazine and watch the video here.
The architecture of Barbara Kruger
The artist Barbara Kruger is known for appropriations of pop culture imagery emblazoned with aggressive texts. The statements in her texts, such as I SHOP THEREFORE I AM and YOUR BODY IS A BATTLEGROUND put against a backdrop of imagery culled from advertising and magazines, implicate the viewer in the struggle for power and control. Her work confronts the notion of individual autonomy and desire in a capitalist consumer society. This post revisits some of her billboard interventions in various cities around the world.
“While Barbara Kruger is of course not an ‘architect’ in the sense of one who makes buildings, many of her works can be read to take on the presence of architecture, including many large public projects as well as room-sized gallery/museum installations and outdoor billboard/bus/etc. pieces. Her architectural sensibility is expressed in the programmatic planning and design of physical space; in this case the creation and transformation of disparate spaces with elements we have come to accept as ‘art.’ Instead of brick and mortar, Kruger builds with photomontages and slogan-cum-wallcovering text.
Kruger uses the greater world as her gallery. Never limited to showing in the ‘official’ venues for art, she shows her work on the cover of Newsweek, in the subways, on buses and buildings— even on t-shirts and matchbooks. So, then, her gallery installations are almost the exception to her ‘public’ style. By bombarding viewers with imagery she brings the in-your-face attitude of the street inside.” - courtesy of J.D. Welch
Barbara Kruger, “We Don’t Need Another Hero”, 1986, Billboard project in Berkeley California
Barbara Kruger, “Untitled (We don’t need another hero)”, 1988-89, 86 Street at West 7 Street, Brooklyn
Barbara Kruger, “Untitled (Your body is a battleground),” 1990, Billboard commissioned by the Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, Ohio, for its “New Works for New Spaces: Into the Nineties” exhibition
Barbara Kruger, “Don’t be a Jerk”, 1996, Billboard across the intersection at the site of present Federation Square
Dome Interpretation
The Hala Stulecia or “Centennial Hall” is a piece of historic architecture located in Wroclaw, Poland. It was built in 1911-13, as one of the first and most astounding structures to artistically utilise reinforced concrete. The undulating and interwoven concrete quatrefoil forms a massive dome. Max Berg, the architect, pushed the possibilities of the reinforced concrete material in a way that had never been done before.
The visual design lab AntiVJ has created a site specific, light and sound installation that fully embraces the mind boggling architecture. They focused on the original architectural blueprints, as well as sci-fi cinematic references such as Fritz Lang’s Metropolis from the 1920s to Tron from the 1980s.
The installation is a contemporary update, harnessing the inherent movement implied by its form. The UNESCO listed building has been given new life by this incredible interconnection between light and sound.
Be sure to watch the making of here.
(via letsbuildahome-fr)
