A previous report that I looked at that I found interesting was Sara Frankel’s Week 3 Looking Outwards about the first 3D printed violin. As she said, “This project harmonizes the art of code and music together.” I found it amazing that someone was able to play something made by a machine with just as much emotion and expression as a man-made instrument. However, I also noticed some different aspects in the tone of the 3D-printed violin that makes it have its own unique sound. I noticed there were even instances where I thought a guitar was playing! Many different algorithms were put into the fabrication of this instrument, and the machine had to be programmed to act like a human was making the instrument. I find this project very inspirational because it demonstrates the many different mediums of music, and that music can be played in many different fashions.
The world’s first 3D printed violin (from Sara’s Looking Outwards)
Coral Cities is a project by Craig Taylor that visualizes cities in a unique way. Cities are usually mapped by their buildings, streets, and popular nodes; however, Taylor wanted to show how liveable a city is. He used raw data (such as crime rate, education, political stability, traffic, etc.) to generate a geo-spatial analysis of cities today, visualized as these coral structures.
This post by fellow architecture student Curran Zhang really stood out to me because of the emphasis in our field for mapping. We have been taught to try to find unique ways to map raw data, and Craig Taylor’s Coral Cities really offers a unique representation that could be interpreted in many different ways.
Reconstructed living human lung tissue on a microfluidic device.
A voxel represents a value on a regular grid in three-dimensional space. Given that understanding, I am fascinated by how this unit can be used to create sculptural works of art. I agree that the most interesting part lies in the data focused physical visualization. I think that the artistic decisions in coordinating colours, as well as selecting a topic of data largely contributes to the beauty of each final piece.
Close-up of data physicalization of the human brain; visualizes bundles of axons.
On the technical side, the program repurposes a multimaterial voxel-printing method that is most often associated with scientific imaging. I find this to be an extremely innovative way to derive new artistic modes. As mentioned in the original review, MIT Media Lab is focusing on advancing 3D printing technology so no titles are given to the works. But, I hope the see this style of media make its way into the art world.
“The Creatures of Prometheus – Generative Visualisation of Beethoven’s Ballet with Houdini” by Simon Russell, (2017)
I think this piece is not only beautiful in terms of execution, but because of how well it communicates the information, it also could be used as an educational piece. I remember in elementary school going on a field trip every year to the Naples Philharmonic and that was pretty much my only exposure to chamber music, albeit still a lot of exposure. For those who do not have the opportunity to have that experience, this visualization is a fantastic way, in a much more modern approach than traditional music education, to show how orchestras work and are put together.
Meandering River is an project that tried to capture the gradual changes and movements of our world rather than just one single snapshot. Based on the sound generated from the river, Onformative used a custom-written algorithm that reinterprets fluctuating river patterns in order to translate the subtle changes in our nature to a visual effect. For me it is very fascinating that they visualized something that is subtle, gradual, easy-to-ignore but certainly happening in our world using computing method. Also, it is fascinating that their ability to deal with the sound data and other senses that are not sight related but eventually visualize these data. For them, art is not a still snapshot of one moment, but a mutative testimony of time, space, and nature.
Meandering River
Details of the Surface
Details of the Surface
The other project they did for sound is the Unnamed Soundsculpture. This moving sound sculpture is based on the recorded motion data of a dancer. They used 3 different Microsoft Kinect cameras and recorded the movement into 3d pointclouds that were synced and exported as one large data set. The final visual effect produced is that particles moving and forming shapes according to the movement of the dancer, which coordinated with the music.
The Mori Building Digital Art Museum. Tokyo, Japan. Opened on June 21st, 2018. Mori Building in collaboration with digital art collective teamLab.
Katherine wrote her very first Looking Outward post about this museum, which claims to be the new era of museums. One that is digital, technical, and immersive. Truly, one large installation of art as opposed to what you might call a normal gallery.
The colors and light displays in particular are truly magical. Even the photos of the exhibit feel completely immersive and sensual. It makes me want to go and interact with it. The original Looking Outward post featured mostly quotes from the article about this piece, which stated that the piece is more an “experience” than it is a “medium”. This whole exhibit raises an interesting question- is this a museum? An installation? An experience? Some sort of playground? When the line gets blurred between passive exhibits and interaction, what does the art become? And is this a new wave of curating art into museums, so that they are more attractive to a public audience? Or is this a new segment of art altogether? I’m unsure, but I’d state definitely that this piece hangs closer to an interactive installation art piece than anything else.
Manuel Lima is a Portuguese-born designer with a leading voice on network visualization, studying how information can be organized and creates beautiful and complex diagrams. Lima has been recognized as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and is named to be one of the “most creative and influential minds of 2009” by Creativity magazine. He is also the founder of VisualComplexity.com which is a visual exploration on mapping complex networks, a showcase for the intersection of art, design, and science. I admire Lima’s work because his work is explores new ways to visualize information as the world moves on from relying on hierarchical trees into and moves into networks as a platform to illustrate and map the complexities of the world.
My favorite project of his is VisualComplexity because it is a unified resource space that aims to leverage a critical understanding of different data visualization methods. When presenting his work, he begins with giving background and an understanding of his motivation behind his project before diving into the projects he has accomplished. By doing so, he shows what makes his work important and why his audience should pay attention to it. Manuel Lima’s website can be found here.
Meejin Yoon is a Korean-American architect and designer that co-founded Höweler+Yoon Architecture, a firm that uses design practices across the domains of architecture, urban design, public space, immersive experience, and design strategy. The firm is based out of Boston, Massachusetts and Munich, Germany.
What I admire about Yoon’s work is the way she chooses to deconstruct the ideas of private and public space by redefining these concepts. Most of her works shown in her talk feature interactions between people, technology, and public/personal space. One of her most stimulating works to me was her public project, Shadow Play, for creating a public parasol as opposed to a private one by utilizing the shape of the Mobius strip (a concept that Yoon is fascinated with) to create shade in a public place.
In her talk, she chooses to use many visual aids and categorizing to break down her speech in an easier way for her audience to understand the range and depth of her work.
Chris is a media artist whose artistic practice reflects his beliefs in Chinese Philosophy. His works combine traditional and futuristic ideas, constantly exploring new mediums and finding aesthetics in technological intervention.
In 2007, Chris founded XEX / XCEED, an interdisciplinary creative studio and new media art collective based in Hong Kong, who’s works have been showcased worldwide. In 2014, he was appointed as the Artistic Director and Curator of the 1st HK-SZ Design Biennale. His creations have won awards from Reddot, TDC, GDC11, Taipei Golden Pin, Design for Asia, and The YG11 of New York Art Director’s Club. Lately, the “RadianceScape” project was selected in Linz Ars Electronica and the live performance was toured in Sónar Festival and WRO Art Biennale.
By the artist:
I’ll present the creative process behind the highly IG-able immersive installation “Prismverse”. The metaphor of the Battle Royale like wearable device “Collar AG”. Using data to intervent an audiovisual performance as Observatory’s live broadcast. We’ll address questions including How mediums shape our behavior and experience? Why open data is essential for a future citizen? And how could a creator design deeply for a minority audience and yet win the appreciation from general public?
THURSDAY, JUNE 7th • 1:50PM • WALKER CINEMA
PRISMVERSE | LIGHT NOW EXHIBITION
Prismverse is an installation inspired by light rays travelling in a diamond with Brilliant cut – a form that produces phenomenal brilliance with maximized light directed through its top. With a 10 meters LED floor and the complex geometrical tessellated mirror wall, the highly illuminated interior becomes a metaphor for the instant tone-up effect of Dr.Jart+ V7 Toning Light.
A journey to unprecedented sceneries of glimmers begins at the touch of the product centered in the space. Audience will be immersed in splendors of our mother nature, ranging from the galaxy and distant stars, rare gemstones, glistens of flowing water, and refracted light beams. These resembles the brightening, moisturizing, protective and vitalizing effects of the product once applied on skin.
Based in California, Kate Hollenbach joined Oblong in 2009 and still works for them. Kate is a designer alongside a programmer who designs for human interactions and physical space. When talking about human interactions and designing for environments, I really admire their workspace, especially the whiteboard, that they develop such programs and how immersive it is to a human. I am inspired to do products design because of human interaction, but the scale on how Kate Hollenbach takes it is much larger. For example, their project tamper where they were able to track human hand movements to manipulate projections was a showcase of how immersive a human movement can be in a setting such as that. The way they embedded the human to be an essential part of the interaction and having the interaction almost as if it was part of them was amazing to see. Kate did an effective job by presenting demonstrations of both professionals and the public as she was talking. It made me want to be a part of either the process or even the final product, but it has taught me that what excites a person the most is showing a glimpse of the final product and then its process.
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