Results 1 - 13 of 13
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
Analogue Interaction (EcoLogicStudio) 2010 biosphere, visualitzation, natural resources, architecture, landscapes, politics, society, environment, energy, data, Venice Biennale
ecoLogicStudio’s installation for AILATI 2010 has been developed in collaboration with the Global Footprint Network group. We aren’t surprised to discover, through data, that the world is going towards a continuous increase of consumption of resources in relation to the biosphere’s capacity. Nevertheless we are wondering, which processes and stories could define this tendency and which are the relations between debtor countries and creditor ones? Most of the political choices today are based on data and graphics shown in these images; how can the single citizen take part in these decisions while interacting with his daily processes, his histories and his inventions? Can technology act as an intermediary, generating devices that link city, architecture and landscape with politics, society and environment? The “ECO-FOOTPRINT DATA GROTTO MACHINE” focuses on the representation in a relational architectonic system, parametrically designed, of the ecological footprint data.
Biomodd Angelo Vermeulen et al. (The Aesthetic Technologies Lab) 2007 sustainability, hacker space, collaboration, open source, computer systems, ecosystem, nature, technology, science, biology, bioart, ecology, art
Biomodd is an open source and co-created art project fusing computer waste and living biology. Essentially, Biomodd creations are computer systems with living ecosystems inside of them. Taken together they form a global art project challenging presumed notions of opposition between nature and technology in different cultures. The project started in 2007 during a residency of Angelo Vermeulen at The Aesthetic Technologies Lab in Athens, Ohio. Since then multiple versions have been built both by the people that originally came up with the idea, and by other communities throughout the world. Up till now, Biomodd versions have been created and showcased in Athens (Ohio), Los Baños and Manila (Philippines), Sint-Niklaas (Belgium), Maribor (Slovenia), and New Plymouth (New Zealand). In 2011 a new Biomodd project will follow in the Netherlands, and in 2012 in New York City. As open source art work, Biomodd can be built and improved upon by anyone.
Capacity for (urban eden, human error) Allison Kudlla 2010 architecture, biology, seeds.moss, art, patterns, plotting, urban, cells, growth, organismscomplexity, emergence, computers
This system uses a computer controlled four-axis positioning table to “print” intricate bio-architectural constructions out of moss and seeds. Suspended in a clear gel growth medium, the moss continues to grow and the seeds sprout. The algorithmically-generated patterns drawn by the system are based on the Eden growth model and leverage mathematical representations of both urban growth and cellular growth, thereby connecting the concept of city with the concept of the organism. This project is working to make concrete the idea of dynamic and fluid computer space altering the expression and formation of a living and growing biological material, via its collaboration with an engineering mechanism.
ElectroStatic Architecture Teresa Buscemi 2008 electricity, energy, responsive environment, architecture, project, waste, light
ElectroStatic Architecture employs the natural regenerative static electricity for interactive and responsive architecture. This project intends to show the accessibility of static electricity and one way in which this existing source of energy can be used to generate another useful and practical form of energy, as well as adding an expressive element to one’s architectural surroundings. With the amount of wasted energy in today’s world and the many ways we are trying to conserve and find alternate sources of energy, why not look to ourselves as a source? We are constantly collecting static electricity through every interaction between people and objects throughout our day. We don’t notice as it builds or when it transfers until it we feel or see it in the form of an electric shock. electroStatic Architecture utilizes the static electricity humans constantly collect and give off, translating the electrostatic energy into light energy embodied in the form of pillars reminiscent of ancient Greek architecture.
Flock House Project Several Authors 2011 project, migration, self-suficience, urban, architecture, habitats, resilience, houses, energy, agriculture, community, politics, autonomous, natural resources, economics, new paradigm, ecosystem, open culture
The Flock House Project is a group of self-contained ecosystems migrating around New York City's five boroughs. What if mobile, self-sufficient living units were the building blocks for future cities? By reflecting the future of urban space and building off of what is already there, Flock House is a group of migratory, public, sculptural habitats that are movable and modular with the ability to merge. In a time when growing urban populations are faced with environmental, political, and economic instability, and when dislocation and relocation is important to consider and reconcile, Flock Houses are choreographed throughout urban centers in the United States and three planes of living (subterranean, ground, and sky).
Kibilight Project Several Authors (solafrica org) electricity, diy, fair-trade, solar energy, solar lamp, community, environment
The objective of this project was to train young people living in Kibera slum (Kenya) to assemble portable solar lamps and then test them for daily uses with the intention of starting a small production centre if the pilot phase is a success. The solar lamps will then be produced by these trained young solar technicians and first sold to the local market. A part of the production will be exported to Switzerland and sold as fair-trade. Pre-fabricated lamps will be used as solar energy learning sets in schools and workshops in Switzerland. The youths were also trained to install solar home systems.
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
My Forest Farm Dirk Fleischmann 2008 reforestatio, .plants, enironment, images, experiment, research, art, carbon, video, farm, exhibition
myforestfarm is a carbon offset program in the form of a reforestation project in partnership with Thomas Daquioag and Renato Habulan located in the mountains near Antipolo City, Philippines. We started to develop 17000 sqm of deforested land in June 2008. In the first stage 500 fruit trees were planted. In 2009 more than 1000 forest trees followed. The effectiveness of tree-planting offsets faces controversy, the logic of the carbon credit market questionable. myforestfarm is an experiment to research on these issues with an artistic approach.
Natural Fuse Husman Haque 2009 game theory, community, architecture, technology, diy design, CO2, environment, energy, electricity, plants, research, design
"Natural fuse" is a micro-scale carbon dioxide overload protection framework that works locally and globally, harnessing the carbon-sinking capabilities of plants. Generating electricity to power the electronic products that populate our lives has consequences on the amount of carbon dioxide present in the atmosphere, which in turn has detrimental environmental effects. The carbon footprint of the power used to run these devices can be offset by the natural carbon-capturing processes that occur as plants absorb carbon dioxide and grow. "Natural Fuse" units take advantage of this phenomena. They are now distributed in households in London, New York and San Sebastian.
Pigeon d'Or Tuur Van Balen 2011 metabolism, city, urban, pigeons, biotechnology, environment, synthetic biology, bacteria, aestethics, design biology
The city is a vast and incredibly complex metabolism in which the human species is the tiniest of fractions; tiny and yet intrinsically linked into an organic embroidery beyond our understanding. It is within this complex fabric that (future) biotechnologies will end up. Pigeon d’Or proposes the use of feral pigeons as a platform and interface for synthetic biology in an urban environment by attempting to make a pigeon defecate soap. By modifying the metabolism of pigeons, synthetic biology allows us to add new functionality to what are commonly seen as “flying rats.” A special bacteria has been designed and created that, when fed to pigeons, turns feces into detergent and is as harmless to pigeons as yoghurt is to humans. Through the pursuit of manipulating pigeon excrement and designing appropriate architectural interfaces, the project explores the ethical, political, practical and aesthetic consequences of designing biology.
Radical - Nature Art and Architecture for a Changing Planet 1969–2009 Several Authors (Barbican) 2009 city, planet, urbanism, climate change, ecology, exhibition, artists, environment, design, architecture, nature, art
The beauty and wonder of nature have provided inspiration for artists and architects for centuries. Since the 1960s, the increasingly evident degradation of the natural world and the effects of climate change have brought a new urgency to their responses. Radical Nature is the first exhibition to bring together key figures across different generations who have created utopian works and inspiring solutions for our ever-changing planet. Radical Nature draws on ideas that have emerged out of Land Art, environmental activism, experimental architecture and utopianism. The exhibition is designed as one fantastical landscape, with each piece introducing into the gallery space a dramatic portion of nature. Work by pioneering figures such as the architectural collective Ant Farm and visionary architect Richard Buckminster Fuller, artists Joseph Beuys, Agnes Denes, Hans Haacke and Robert Smithson are shown alongside pieces by a younger generation of practitioners.
Roots Roman Kirschner 2005 generative art, soundart, newmedia, fungi, electricity, art, water, installation
A world with a fluid atmosphere in a glass tank. Dark crystals grow trying to make connections. Constellations develop. They generate sound. And after some time they dissolve into clouds..., Dynamic Sculpture, 2005-2006.