Results 1 - 25 of 25
Project Persons Year Tags
Active Phytoremediation Wall System Skidmore,Owings, Merrill (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) 2012 hydroponics, plants, buildings, environment, energy saving, rhizome, materials, air refreshing
The Active Phytoremediation Wall System is a modular system of pods, housing hydroponic plants. Its main purpose is to encourage airflow and contribute to the quality of life through its air cleaning capacities. The project is a result of a collaborative research between Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. It is a bio-mechanical hybrid system that produces ‘fresh air’ from within buildings, thereby reducing the energy consumption. Because the plants’ roots are exposed, instead of being buried in soil, the plants’ air-cleaning capacity increases by 200 to 300 percent. The pods themselves are made from vacuum-formed plastic, and the form allows the maximum amount of air to reach the root rhizomes while using the minimum amount of material. It also creates a beautiful base for the plants. The wall system can be installed in large commercial interiors, but works equally well in small settings—a four-module system in an apartment would have the impact of 800 to
Annamaria Weldon Web Annamaria Weldon education, landscapes, workshops, photography, poetry, tradittion, writing, nature
Annamaria Weldon is a West Australian poet who also writes and publishes in other genres, and has done since her first feature article appeared in 1978. Working with words in different ways, she’s developed the writing practice which has sustained her for more than thirty years through changes of career, home life and location.
BBa_K221000: First volume of teenage gene poems Yashas Shetty,Mukund Thattai (ArtScienceBangalore) 2011 dna, genes, biotechnology, bacteria, genetics, narrtive, synthetic biology, diy, lab, genetic engineering, artwork, rain
BBa_K221000 is a sequence of DNA that produces an enzyme called geosmin, which is responsible for the smell of wet earth when it begins to rain. When BBa_k221000 is transformed (injected) into the DNA of E. coli bacteria, it transforms the bacteria into “living machines” that produce the smell of rain. The mystique surrounding the aroma of the Indian monsoon is encoded as a genetic sequence. This is an artistic investigation into the narrative and promises of synthetic biology. The installation comprises a mobile DIY bio lab housed in a geodesic dome. The lab is equipped with all the facilities needed to perform rudimentary genetic engineering and is built entirely out of hacked, local, homemade consumer electronics. The bacteria / “living machines” are grown inside the lab in a custom-made incubator inviting the audience to engage, up-close in critical debates around such forms of biotechnologies. The lab also functions as a pedagogical space and artist studio, as it hosts artists’ workshops and performances and also facilitates the conceptual development of artworks that are produced by borrowing tools and methodologies from the life sciences. This mobile bio lab is collapsible and can be re-assembled in a day. The entire process of building the lab is documented and made available at http://artscienceblr.org or http://hackteria.org/wiki
Christa Sommerer & Laurent Mignonneau Web Page Christa Sommerer & Laurent Mignonneau 1992-2010 research, ecology, artificial life, human-machine interaction, video, 3D, language, society, nature, real-time interactive systems, web page, environment, self-organization, interactive, art, artists, genetics, biology, complexity, interaction, education, interface
Christa Sommerer& Laurent Mignonneau are two of the most renowned and innovative artists on the international media art and interactive art scene. In a natural and intuitive way, their work develops interactive interfaces that apply principles of the theory of living systems related to ecology, artificial life and the complexity science.
Christien Meindertsma Web Page Christien Meindertsma portfolio, artist, inspiration, product, books, knitting, raw materials, life of products, industry, global world, art, design
Christien Meindertsma explores the life of products and raw materials. For her first book, Checked Baggage (2004), Christien purchased a container filled with a week's worth of objects confiscated at security checkpoints in Schiphol Airport after 9/11. She meticulously categorized all 3267 items and photographed them on a white seamless background. Christien’s second book, PIG 05049 (2007), is an extensive collection of photographic images that documents an astounding array of products that different parts of an anonymous pig called 05049 could support. With this book, Christien reveals lines that link raw materials with producers, products and consumers that have become so invisible in an increasingly globalized world.
Extreme Green Guerrillas Michiko Nitta 2007 green guerrilla, migration systems, communication, food, euthanasia, community
We are forced to face the reality on a daily basis that environmental damage is more advanced than experts predicted. As global warming becomes the top of almost every government's agenda, recent trends have put pressure on world leaders to act immediately: for instance, forced recycling, carbon offsetting and a 10-year campaign to make environmentally friendly living fashionable. Are these efforts really improving the environment? are these activities saving the earth? what is eco-friendly living? when we live in a period where the worlds climate disaster is about to happen, how can we live the ultimate green lifestyle? The project takes current green trends to the extreme by proposing a community of people called "Extreme Green Guerrillas". This project fell into three design proposals, which explore their lifestyles and systems they use to enjoy their lives: Communication, Feast and Death.
Flooded McDonald's Bjørnstjerne Christiansen,Rasmus Nielsen,Jakob Fenger (Superflex) 2009 mcdonalds, fast-food, climate change, culture, food, film, video, intervention
Flooded McDonald's is a film work by Superflex in which a convincing life-size replica of the interior of a McDonald's burger bar, without any customers or staff present, gradually floods with water. Furniture is lifted up by the water, trays of food and drinks start to float around, electrics short circuit and eventually the space becomes completely submerged.
Haberlandt (blablabLAB) 2011 arduino, biology, bioreactor, chemistry, diy, electronics, fluids, molecular, gastronomy, pH, science, spectrophotometer, spirulina
Haberlandt is a vending machine food crops. At the same time biorector for growing a superfood -Arthospira platensis microalgae-and automated avant-cuisine machine. An array cyborg. Mechatronic ecosystem where life and technological systems coexist. A sharp but open system with inputs and outputs typical of an entity that depends ona chemical-energy exchange for their persistence. The machine produces algae as the ultimate goal but needs to be recharged with a minimum contribution of nutrients, being able to reduce this cycle of exchange of seaweed to human consumption (output) and human urine of rejection (input).
Hydramax (FUTURE CITIES LAB) 2012 garden, architecture, buildings, landscape, infrastructure, machine, sensors, robotics, air, solar energy, intelligent buildings, community, water parks, sea, water, urban
Future Cities Lab’s HYDRAMAX Port Machines project proposes a radical rethinking of San Francisco’s urban waterfront post sea-level rise. The proposal renders the existing hard edges of the waterfront as new “soft systems” that would include aquatic parks, community gardens, wildlife refuges and aquaponic farms. A synthetic architecture is introduced that blurs the distinction between building, landscape, infrastructure and machine. Using thousands of sensors and motorized components, the massive urban scale robotic structure harvests rainwater and fog, while modulating air flow, solar exposure and intelligent building systems.
Incubator Art Lab Jennifer Willet et al. (School of Visual Arts, The University of Windsor) 2009 lab, science, art, ecology, innovative production, performance, biotechnology, technology of the body, community, complexity
NCUBATOR Hybrid Laboratory at the Intersection of Art, Science and Ecology is a physical and theoretical hub, a new art/science laboratory at The University of Windsor. Founded in 2009 it functions both as an apparatus in which environmental conditions can be controlled towards the assisted proliferation of life, but also as a site that supports the proliferation of new ideas – new artistic practices. Physically and metaphorically INCUBATOR serves as site for innovative productive and performative imaginings of biotechnology as a technology of the body – a complex ecology – that implicates each of us intellectually and biologically in the continued propagation of the life sciences.
Insect Robots Leonel Moura 2008 robotics, biology, aestethics, mechanics, sound, environment, insects, ai
Based on the BEAM robotics (Biology, Electronics, Aesthetics, Mechanics) the exhibition depicts a series of over 100 small autonomous robots with different morphologies and characteristics. A large installation shows 50 cricket-like small robots imprisoned in droplet glass shapes creating a kind of jungle sound environment. Other robots look like small trees or move around like insects. BEAM robotics is presented here as a new kind of (artificial) life.
Is there a horizon in the deep water? Helen Evans,Heiko Hansen (HeHe) 2011 bp, gulf of mexico, ocean, oil spill, oil, performance, art, pool
is there a horizon in the deep water? is a performance by HeHe that reconstructs, in miniature, the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in an outdoor swimming pool. This event triggered the BP oil spill, the largest ever recorded marine oil spill, causing immense damage to ocean and coastal wildlife habitats across vast areas in the Gulf of Mexico. Any suggestion that an open-air swimming pool might suffer the same fate as the Gulf of Mexico and become polluted for the sake of art is provocative and absurd. In fact, during the performance harmful or poisonous substances do not contaminate the pool, unless you consider art to be corrosive and corruptive. The work aims to bring home to audiences the significance of the disaster, albeit on a very small scale.
LO2P (Atelier CMJN) 2011 recycling, cars, pollution, transportation, natural resources, city, environment, materials, energy, waste, CO2, O2, architecture
The projet is a recycling center made of recycled cars. Because of the development of the public transportation system and the depletion of their resources, personal vehicles are going to become obsolete and their number will significantly decrease. Instead of throwing them, we will use them as resources. Composed of 74% of metal, they provide good material for construction. Therefore, manufactured products which have polluted their entire life are the base of our new environmental device. In its functioning, it uses and recycles all of its energies. It provides new materials and services to the city. It is a wonderful laboratory which experiments a new kind of project that inverts the current one way process turning resources into wastes. We dream of a project that would turn wastes back into resources, something that would looks like: Wastes + Pollution + CO2 -> Resources + O2
N55 Ion Sørvin 1994 communication, society, lifestyle, land, alternative economy, education, architecture, environment, P2P-Design, art
N55 is a platform for persons who wants to work together, share places to live, economy, and means of production. N55 is based both in Copenhagen, and in LAND.
Natural Resilience Catherine Verpoort (Textile Futures) 2012 project, design, resilience, biology, textiles, materials
The project is inspired by nature’s ability to process and conquer even artificial materials and surfaces in order to sustain and enforce itself. Nature’s immense strength and power is accompanied by an aesthetic that indicates a peaceful progression of time. The emergence of moss, fungi and plants, as well as their disappearing, brings life into the inanimate materials and objects. The project explores how we can design materials that respond to nature and its resilience.
Plant Akira Nakayasu (Kyushu University, ADCDU) 2010 installation, video, art, wind, plants, technology, memory alloy, artificial life
Description: the plant is an interactive installation inspired by the vision of grass blowing in the wind. 169 artificial leaves are controlled by using the shape memory alloy actuators we developed. All each leaf is independently controlled and reacts to hand´s movement and moves slowly.
Searching for the Ubiquitous Genetically Engineered Machine Yashas Shetty,Mukund Thattai (ArtScienceBangalore) 2012 biology, life, living parts, soil, environment, synthetic biology, engineered products, ecology, lab, biotechnology
In Synthetic Biology, the Biobrick has been used as an abstraction or template for creating standardized functional living parts. Searching for UGEM is an alternate re-appropriations of the BioBrick by using existing BioBrick primers as random-PCR(Polymerase Chain Reaction) primers in investigating soil samples. This random PCR will provide a succinct signature of the biological diversity present in these samples. These investigations of soil lead us to ask questions about citizen’s science "performed" by non-institutional actors using accessible tools as well as gives us a glimpse into the "post-natural world" where BioBricks may end up in our environment and may very well show up as bands in a gel. By imagining a world in which the Biobrick has become the accepted standard for synthetic biology, and where these engineered products are ubiquitous in our lives and environments, the samples we archive will serve as the baseline from which the subsequent extent of human influence can be measured. These investigations are carried out in a custom built public research laboratory, the blueprints for making one are available online. These Autonomous Public Laboratories can be used as template for creating a citizen's research lab with which one can carry out "experiments"-biotechnological or otherwise.
Surface Tension Several Authors (Science Gallery) 2011 water, future, artists, exhibition, natural resources, sustainability, environment, science, engineering, politics
The future of water is the subject of tension. Water is both disposable and sacred, a muse for artists and a necessity for life – a source of healing and of conflict. The Earth has abundant water, but only a very small proportion is available for human use. How should this be managed and sustained, and what would a water-scarce future look like? SURFACE TENSION brings together work by artists, designers, engineers and scientists to explore the future of water, playing on its physical properties, its role in politics and economics, and ways in which it may be harnessed, cleaned, and distributed.
SymbioticA Several Authors (The University of Western Australia) research, bio art, biology, biotechnology, design, education, laboratory, science, art
SymbioticA is the first research laboratory of its kind, enabling artists and researchers to engage in wet biology practices in a biological science department. It also hosts residents, workshops, exhibitions and symposiums. With an emphasis on experiential practice, SymbioticA encourages better understanding and articulation of cultural ideas around scientific knowledge and informed critique of the ethical and cultural issues of life manipulation. The Centre offers a new means of artistic inquiry where artists actively use the tools and technologies of science, not just to comment about them but also to explore their possibilities.
TechnoMorphica Several Authors (V2_) 1997 book, essays, design, phylosophy, semiotics, intelligence, life, parasites, cyborg, science, evolution, biology, technology
Will technomorphization – the reorganization of the organic based on the intelligent machine model – become the dominant process of our age? Has evolution entered a technological scientific phase in which humans no longer develop in natural ways, in which the human body instead adapts itself to the parameters of a technological era? In this book, fourteen internationally acclaimed authors give their views on this blurring of borders and the fusion of the biological with the technological. It offers ideas on angels and robots, viruses and mad cows, a world where machines are anthromorphized and humans technomorphized. If the glare of our monitors is all that illuminates us, is it time to build a museum for the sun?
The Body is a Big Place Peta Clancy,Helen Pynor 2012 transplantation, death, biology, bio-art, installation, sculpture, heart, organs, live
‘The Body is a Big Place’ explores organ transplantation and the ambiguous thresholds between life and death, revealing the process of death as an extended durational moment, rather than an event that occurs in a single moment in time. This bio-art work is a large-scale immersive installation comprising a 5-channel video projection, a fully functioning bio-sculptural heart perfusion system, an undulating aqueous soundscape, and a single channel video work. ‘The Body is a Big Place’ re-enacted certain defining aspects of the human heart transplant process. The heart perfusion device was used to reanimate to a beating state a pair of fresh pig hearts in 2 performances staged during the exhibition. Rather than sensationalising these performative events, the artists sought to encourage empathic responses from viewers, activating the bodies of viewers by appealing to their somatic senses and fostering their identification with the hearts they were watching. This opened up the possibility of a deeper awareness and connection with viewers’ own interiors.
The Great Work of the Metal Lover Adam Brown 2012 alchemi, science, art, transmutation, biology, microbiology, bacterium, bioreactor, life, chemistry, gold, electron microscopy
Magnum Opus, or The Great Work, is an Alchemical process that describes a personal, spiritual and chemical method for creating the Philosopher’s Stone, a mysterious red colored substance that was capable of transmuting base matter into the noble metal of gold. Efforts made to discover the principals of the Philosopher’s Stone was one of the defining and at the same time seemingly unobtainable objectives of Western Alchemy. The Great Work of the Metal Lover is an artwork that sits at the intersection of art, science and alchemy, re-examining the problem of transmutation through the use of modern microbiological practice and thus solving the ancient riddle.
The Tissue Culture and Art Project Ionat Zurr 2004 art, tissues, organisms, cells, biotechnology, life, biology, future scenarios, ethics, environment, science, sustainability, wearable technology
The Tissue Culture & Art Project (TC&A;) was set to explore the use of tissue technologies as a medium for artistic expression. We are investigating our relationships with the different gradients of life through the construction/growth of a new class of object/being - that of the Semi-Living. These are parts of complex organisms which are sustained alive outside of the body and coerced to grow in predetermined shapes. These evocative objects are a tangible example that brings into question deep rooted perceptions of life and identity, concept of self, and the position of the human in regard to other living beings and the environment. We are interested in the new discourses and new ethics/epistemologies that surround issues of partial life and the contestable future scenarios they are offering us.
The World in a Shell - the polliniferous project Hans Kalliwoda 2010 research, renewable energy, architecture, urban, community, sustainability, installation, autonomy, indigenous, green-design, pollution, environmentart
The World in a Shell, an ambitious work in progress by artist Hans Kalliwoda, brings together themes including art and science, communities and cultural heritage. The World in a Shell is a high-tech, self-sufficient container that functions as a mobile laboratory and living unit. The container can be folded out into a large shell-shaped construction in which exhibitions, presentations and workshops can be held. In collaboration with Delft University of Technology, Kalliwoda and his team have equipped the container with the very latest sustainable technologies. Solar energy, water recycling, and communication facilities ensure the container can function autonomously in every possible environment. The project is a model of sustainability and spreads the message that the most advanced technologies can be used without harming the environment or disturbing a community's way of life.
Yoichiro Kawaguchi web page Yoichiro Kawaguchi growth, self-organization, art, algorithm, complexity, generative art, computers
Professor Kawaguchi is an expert on the "GROWTH model," a self-organizing method to give form to one's rich imagination or to develop one's formative algorithm of a complex life form. As the art or a time progression, a program generates a form and this form is allowed to grow systematically according to a set formula. Howwever, this "GROWTH Model" is not based on a static process that allows constructive mathematics to take its course. Though observation of eddies and spirals, repetitions of simple form of inner mathematical principles, which are hidden behind the seemingly complex outlook of living creatures, are deduced. Placing subtle forms like that of a conch shell as a starting point, the shapes of ammonite, nautilus, tentacles, plant vines and coral become visual references for this model.