The most fascinating thing to me by far is when someone developes something, whether functioning or static, that gracefully walks the line between art and science.

The SolarSinger, a fascinating piece of engineering by Markus Kayser, falls into this category. But what makes it art? Is it the machine, the product, the questionable usefullness or perhaps Markus’ clothes?

One of the details I find particulary interesting is that he’s harnessing the energy from the sun using glass to make glass. We all did those experiments when we were kids but I can’t say it ever occured to me to use those powers to create rather than to destroy. Check out the video below documenting the process of this cool and fairly simple concept of using the hot sun in the vast open desert for the purpose to create.

Markus Kayser – Solar Sinter Project from Markus Kayser on Vimeo.

People are continuously pondering whether plants have audible communication abilities or if they scream when they are hurt or chopped down. Even Mythbusters did a show that put the latter to the test which was ultimately busted but had moments of possibility. So what do you think, can plants talk?

Artist Luke Jerram thinks they can and set out to make an art piece centered around the audible abilities. However what he captured is not so much communication as it is a concerto of noise that lead to his aptly title installation, Plant Orchestra.

Jerram’s artistic interests parallel my own so I can’t help but enjoy his work that pulls from his own fascination with the natural wonders of the world. This piece in particular explores an entirely acoustic experience that seeks to put the viewer in the world of the plant whether it feels comforting, overwhelming or even downright scary due to the unfamiliarity of this strange place.

In the artist’s words:

Although imperceptible to the human ear, plants create sound. Using specialist microphones water can be heard as it flows slowly up the stem of a plant. If trees are suffering from drought, scientists can measure acoustic emissions that occur caused by cavitation and embolism within the plant. The sounds created during the day are different to those at night and they alter with the seasons of the year.

Amplifying the acoustic emissions of plants using dozens of special microphones the Plant Orchestra reveals this new and hidden acoustic world. Through amplifyication, each plant is transformed into a musical instrument and becomes part of The Plant Orchestra.

The video below captures the experience of the Plant Orchestra at Night Jar at the Cambridge Botanical Garden which was the very first installation of the piece. “Hundreds of sound samples were recorded from dozens of plants within the glasshouses for the arts project. The best recordings were then played from their prospective plants as part of a light and sound installation.”

images via Luke Jerram

Figure drawing, both in motion and static pose, has been an artform for years. However, while a static pose is easy to translate into three dimensional form like someone sitting, standing or sort of frozen in time, capturing the actual form that movement takes is not.

Raphael Perret, a scientific assistant at the IAD program at ZHdK focused on interface theory, hardware interaction and real-time video processing sought to overcome the disadvantage that the three dimensional form has in capturing the actual act of motion as well as to find a way in which the viewer can physically experience this space. The latter is intriguing to me – to get inside the space of movement. Movement AS space.

What emerged is what Perret calls Project Bodycloud and he explains what fueled the desire for this project:

About ten years ago, I visited Brazil with my Capoeira club. The way, how incredibly elegant Mestre Corisco moved through space impressed me deeply. Since that moment, I was dreaming of doing a sculpture from movement.

The goal is to produce the sculpture in lifesize as a positive and negative. The latter meaning a solid block with the movement carved into the material. So the visitor can crawl into the space and explore it with the body.

Below are some videos of the process. First, motion sequences were captured then translated in the computer. From there, a continuous volume was rendered and then 3-dimensionally printed as a mini sculpture, like shown at the top of this post.

Milton #10.2.1 from Raphael Perret on Vimeo.

Milton #10.2 (Actor) from Raphael Perret on Vimeo.

Below are several rendering studies of the movement from different sequences as well as more information about the purpose of this project:

Human movement space is defined as the space a person appropriates by means of his or her movement, a space that is constantly expanded as the person moves. I am interested in movement spaces because it reflects the personal usage of space. Despite its habitual and daily character, this process can be cultivated and developed according to a person’s talent and physical ability. Along these lines, the personal appropriation and design of space starts with one’s body. In order to visualize this constitution, I choose the process of materialization into a sculpture. Thereby, I will try to the render this essentially ephemeral movement space tangible.

images via Raphael Perret

I’ve had pictures of Arne Quinze‘s piece, “The Sequence” just sort of bumping around in various spots I throw photographs for inspiration. I keep coming back to this one and I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to make a post about it. It’s simplicity continually pulls me back – just straight pieces of wood moving through space in a nebulous cloud of orange anchored in only a few spots. It feels both light and heavy at the same time and naturally glowing yet the piece does not incorporate a single piece of lighting.

The piece, however, is more than just simple sticks moving through space in an elegant way and it acts also as a linkage between the Flemish Parliament and the House of Flemish Representatives. The piece performs both a physical and metaphorical connection.

From the artist, “THE SEQUENCE bridges the communication gap between people and generates movement in the city. I want to reconnect people and let them interact with each other like they did in the past on squares. At least people talked to each other then.”

This piece by the Belgian artist was installed on November 13, 2008 and will stay in place for at least 5 years. When the piece is taken down, all of the wood will be reused for another purpose.

images via Arne Quinze and

Sculptural work that often impresses me the most are those that use everyday, average materials that are not inherently beautiful. A good example is plain old scotch tape which is not typically seen as a sculptural material on it’s own however the character of the tape being clear, reflective and moldable lends well to building interesting shapes.

This video of a temporary installion is stunning – the music, the way the sculpture goes together, the lighting and shadows. Well done. Like a web in a forgotten corner of the city.

Une Toile from Nemo Tral on Vimeo.

This next video is interesting because, unlike the pure beauty of the one above (although still beautiful, especially with the light), you get a better feel for how the sculpture is created in a more structural sense.

Toile-Expérience from Nemo Tral on Vimeo.

At the end of August, some of the best graffiti artists in the world descended on Nelson Street in Bristol as part of an ambitious urban street art project called See No Evil. Over the course of three days, these artists transformed previously bleak and grey spaces and their looming concrete walls into gigantic works of art.

US artists included world-renowned a href=”http://elmac.net/”>El Mac out of Los Angeles and New York based Tats Cru, Inkie and UK’s Zeus and Nick Walker.

images via antidote bristol

I’m addicted to the work of various photographers that capture amazing imagery of urban life. But what about imagery of completely created spaces that don’t actually exist? Artist Lori Nix photographs spaces however the twist is that they are spaces completely created by her as dioramas and not a single thing has been edited in the computer. She even chooses to work with film. Her work, like the image above, because it creates this magical world somewhere between reality and fiction through her lens. Her scenes from “The City” bring to reality the question of what might happen when people no longer inhabit our cities and nature has taken over – the ruins of modern day life.

Other projects like “Accidentally Kansas” create images from her own memories of the bizarreness surrounding reality and “Unnatural History” is based around the 1940′s when science was a bit fuzzy.

In Lori’s words, she describes her inspiration:

I am fascinated, maybe even a little obsessed, with the idea of the apocalypse. In addition to my childhood experiences with natural disasters, I also grew up watching 1970s films known as “disaster flicks”. I remember watching Towering Inferno, Earthquake, Planet of Apes and sitting in awe in the dark. Here was the same type of dangers I had experienced day to day being magnified and played out on the big screen in a typical Hollywood way. Each of these experiences has greatly influenced my photographic work. The series Accidentally Kansas explored my personal experience with the natural disasters of my childhood. The City postulates what it would be like to live in a city that is post man-kind, where man has left his mark by the architecture, but mother nature is taking back these spaces. Flora, fauna and insects mix with the detris of high and low culture.

images via Lori Nix

“It’s about overcoming obstacles in any way you can”

While living in the Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza where problems abound with overcrowding, unemployment and a lack of education, Mohommad and Abdallah escape through the artform of Parkour within their outdoor environment which teaches them the physical and mental discipline of overcoming obstacles.

This short documentary called Free Running Gaza from the Artscape program at Al Jazeera follows the young men as they work on their latest video for their YouTube site as well as explain and demonstrate how parkour allows them to feel free and as if they have been “transported to another world.”

image via flickr/rajaaonline

So often I am captivated by art purely by process and Judith Braun‘s latest technique is especially fascinating. With fingers dipped in charcoal, she draws patterns directly on the exhibition walls that have a very unique feel – full of personality in such simple strokes of gradation that move like sound or water.

Braun’s latest installation in Vienna at Galerie Andreas Huber:

images via Judith Braun