highlike

Knight Architects and structural engineers AKT II

Moving footbridge
Paddington, London
Opening in sequence, the bridge’s five beams rise to different angles to create a fan-like effect. The first rises to 70 degrees, while the last lifts high enough to create a clearance space of two and a half metres over the surface of the canal. The weight of the beams – which range from six to seven tons – is balanced by a 40 ton counterweight that keeps the beams steady as they rise and fall.

Ryoji Ikeda

point of no return

With point of no return, Ryoji Ikeda condenses the unknowable chaos of the event horizon of a black hole into a work of order and balance. Composing a delicate assemblage of basic shapes, sounds, light and shadow, the artist eschews the intricacies of data for a more sculptural approach. While gesturing towards the sublime, the infinite expanse of space and the immense, reality-warping gravitational force of a black hole, he focuses in on the beauty of the physical, bringing together a few simple elements to make sense of something unthinkably complex. Through his own artistic process of playing with space, the artist finds purity in basic structures while drawing inspiration from the vast scope of the universal. “point of no return is a very simple, very intense piece,” he says.

Fito Segrera

The form of becoming
In this abstract system, each intelligent agent is embodied as a motor, the states in its environment is represented as an angular range of rotation and the actions as one of two directions in which each agent can move a linear actuator. Each linear system holds a segment of a long black string, this translates as a point in the represented line. Once the system runs, each agent learns, from informational equivalents of pain and pleasure, to move towards the highest values within its environment, this means ultimately to displace its position from point A to B. In order for an agent to learn, it needs time, generations of exploration, each agent will get punished for bad decisions and rewarded for appropriate ones. Every time a learning generation is finished, a light will blink for that particular agent, indicating the end of a cycle and the achievement of new knowledge; the agent becomes more intelligent. Once all agents learned to be and stay in point B, the system, as a collective, has successfully mutated into a stable, balanced, symmetric and silent form; a straight line. Finally, after a few seconds, the sculpture forgets, all agents are rebooted and the cycle of creation, chaos and order restarts, this time with a totally different and unique behavior.

Nao Tamura

Lexus Interconnection
There are forces in nature that are beyond the control of mankind. We have learned how fragile we are in the face of such forces. However, we have also learned the importance of accepting nature and learning to live in harmony with it. Interconnected and interdependent, there is a constant give-and-take in nature. Life does not rest. Our collective motion, nature’s response to our movements is essential to our planet’s delicate balance. When we are one with nature, we are at our most powerful. Our movement together gives us life. Our movement forward creates the next generation of ideas. Life is always more amazing in motion.

Roberto Pugliese

Equilibrium Variant
This work has the purpose of exploring the occurrence of the Larsen effect (also known as feedback) through the use of mobile devices in a three-dimensional space. The distinctive screech of the Larsen effect typically occurs when a microphone catches the sound emitted by a speaker. It engages when the microphone is located too close to the speaker, and gets in the way of its frequency. The microphone amplifies and reproduces the speaker’s frequency with an ever-increasing width, virtually unlimited, in practice stopped by the amplifier’s clip. On a ground support, two mechanical arms are located. At the end of one arm there is a microphone, and on the end of the other there is a speaker. A software, created with this specific purpose, manages the position of the arms in a dynamic way, and provides that the distance between the microphone and the speaker never causes the amplifier to clip. This way, the system tends to reach an equilibrium that is physically impossible to attain. The struggle to balance creates an acoustic and visual dimension that is never the same: the frequency of feedback and the movements of the mechanical arms are always different and change in real time.

Greg Dunn and Brian Edward

Self-Reflected

Dr. Greg Dunn (artist and neuroscientist) and Dr. Brian Edwards (artist and applied physicist) created Self Reflected to elucidate the nature of human consciousness, bridging the connection between the mysterious three pound macroscopic brain and the microscopic behavior of neurons. Self Reflected offers an unprecedented insight of the brain into itself, revealing through a technique called reflective microetching the enormous scope of beautiful and delicately balanced neural choreographies designed to reflect what is occurring in our own minds as we observe this work of art. Self Reflected was created to remind us that the most marvelous machine in the known universe is at the core of our being and is the root of our shared humanity.

CHANG YEN TZU

Self Luminous 2 – Unbalance
Self-luminous 2 is an experimental handmade instrument shown as performance. It is a series-project which I have been working on since 2013 and finally developed into shape in 2014. I am looking for intimate and personal instrument that reflects on the relation of digital sound and light message. In computer language, light on is 1 and light off is 0. If more than 2 lamps, it could be code or readable possibility by the meanings. When I press the button or turn the knob, the message will be sent to Pure Data, and the sound will be triggered in live by Pure Data.
The Data of sound such as frequency and volume, are analysed and sent out to the second Arduino to control the light. The light, in thus case, is an intuitive element for human beings. From this point, it is really close to sound which disturbs our biological body directly. The lights are visualised and they can be transferred the into messages. The message might be readable by coincidence with the link to the code. The light is bright enough to let audience to have persistence of vision in mind. During the performance, the sound will be reproduced by code and part of it is impromptu.
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Rothschild Eva

Cages
Rothschild’s practice involves both conceptual and socio-political ideas alongside traditional approaches to making sculpture. Through an investigation into form and materiality, her works balance, stack, wrap and knot materials around geometric shapes and structures – such materials that often appear to transcend their physical limitations, hover between representation, symbolism and actual form. By deliberately destabilizing physical and visual characteristics in her work, Rothschild not only questions the aesthetics of art, in particular minimalism, but also those of belief in social liberation and spiritual movements.

POSTCOMMODITY

Do You Remember When?

The hole and exposed earth of Do You Remember When? becomes a spiritual, cultural and physical portal – a point of transformation between worlds – from which emerges an Indigenous worldview engaging a discourse on sustainability. The block of concrete on the pedestal – the foundation of the institution constructed on top of tribal lands – functions as a trophy celebrating Indigenous intervention in opposition to a Western scientific worldview. The closed-circuit audio broadcast of a Pee Posh social dance song performed by the collective provides the psychosocial soundtrack of the transformation process. The work shifts the sustainability from a focus dominated by Western science to a balanced approach inclusive of Indigenous knowledge systems.