Hasta La Ideas

Dezeen Screen: designer Jólan van der Wiel has sent us this movie of his machine for shaping stools using gravity and magnets, on display as part of the [D3] Contest for young designers at imm cologne in Germany this week. Watch the movie »

Science and design collide to offer a glimpse of a parallel universe

Setting up shop at Designersblock in a relatively quiet spot in the vast London Design Festival, Patrick Stevenson-Keating managed to avoid the clamoring masses on opening night. What he may lack in promotional capabilities he more than makes up for in pioneering spirit and sublimely engaging source material.

Stevenson-Keating, who graduated just this year from Dundee University with top honors in product design, showed two projects at Designersblock, The Quantum Parellelograph and On Our Way to the Impossible.

The Quantum Parellelograph is an exploratory piece examining the science and philosophy of Oxford professor David Deutsch’s parallel universe theory and the earlier work of professor Hugh Everett. Stevenson-Keating explains that “there might be infinite copies of ourselves within multiple universes.”

Harnessing the Internet and basic personal information, the simulation machine can be dialed in to a customizable alternate reality. The user can calibrate the machine according to the desired “distance” from one’s real life, pushing a button to receive a printed receipt outlining their hypothetical life in a parallel universe. We decided to go deep in our tinkering, and received a printout telling us that “in 20 years’ time Richard Prime may not be born yet.”

Stevenson-Keating goes on to explain that, while up until recently, the notions of the parellel universe has been confined to the realms of science fiction. However, scientists are beginning to turn more serious attention to the potential of the existence of the alternate space in time.

This focus on science and design sets Stevenson-Keating apart from many of his contemporaries. “I try to blend science and design,” he says. “If you think about it, there are people whose job it is to look at the stars and then there are thousands of amateur stargazers. So why not science?”

Exemplifying that approach is the other objet the designer brought to London, On Our Way to the Impossible. The project attempts to visualize complicated scientific thinking and abstract concepts in a way the public might understand without diluting the ideas themselves.

Stevenson-Keating thought it best to apply this thinking to bridge the gap between advanced science and how the public is informed about its possibilities. According to the description on his website, his particle accelerator—created with the buzzed-about and largely misunderstood Hadron Super Collider as the model—”aims to show that design can be used as a tool to take people beyond what most of us think is possible, and after seeing it, you just might think a little differently.”

The designer cites as his inspiration the 18th-century scientists whose discoveries gave birth to the era of enlightenment and goes on to ponder whether our current contemporary batch of amateurs will bring forth a second era of science. Check out Stevenson-Keating’s next exhibition at the Birmingham Design Fair in January 2012.

A freelance programmer using DIY technology as a tool to teach with Machine Project

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Catering to “overambitious amateur enthusiasts,” Machine Project conjures up an idiosyncratic fusion of classes and workshops that masterfully craft pedagogy out of the infinite realm of possibility. Hosting a range of workshops from psychic communion with plants to the typography of ransom notes, Machine Project is a non-profit arts organization that operates as an “informal educational institution” from its unassuming storefront in the Echo Park district of Los Angeles. Founder Mark Allen explains the cult appeal of the classes, stating, “We found that an engineer and a poet talking about noise music was even more interesting than a group of poets talking about poetry or a group of scientists discussing science.”

Born in Vermont, Allen received his MFA at the California Institute of the Arts and began honing his curatorial leanings towards the obscure through a series of trial and error. In Houston, Allen ran a gallery called Revolution Summer that adopted the Marxist theme of time as currency for the purchase of art works. Shortly after moving to LA, Allen became involved with the subversive art collective, C-Level (currently reincarnated as Betalevel), a group that was known for such sardonic situationist commentary as virtual cockfighting—contestants donned rooster suits with sensors—and the shock-inducing video game, Tekken Torture Tournament.

While at C-Level Allen started to combine his love for technology with a flourishing aptitude for teaching, which laid the groundwork for his philosophical approach to Machine Project. “My interest in teaching unexpected, creative and unsanctioned uses of technology in the production of art is in direct support to the idea that technology is a tool which can be used by any motivated individual,” he says. As a freelance programmer and a faculty member of the Digital Art Related Program Activities (DARPA) initiative at Pomona College, Allen relies heavily on the gestalt of technology factors in creating new courses at Machine Project, but at the same time invites a naturalistic study of the world around us.

In 2008, Machine Project took over the Los Angeles County Museum of Art for a day, and turned it inside out as a metaphorical nature center of activity, comprised of more than 60 projects that included “ambient haircuts,” musical elevators and a murder mystery entitled “A Machine Project Field Guide to the LA County Museum of Art.” Inspired by the artistry of set designers Christy McCaffrey and Sara Newey who designed the ornate gate created for the event, Allen asked the team to imagine a transformative environment for Machine Project’s own storefront. The result was an immersive forest installation that housed woodland-themed events involving banjo plucking, elf lore and “a presentation by some very dedicated Bigfoot enthusiasts.”

The inquisitive wit and spirited atmosphere at Machine Project is reflected in both the class subjects—a selection based on chance meetings with talented individuals—and the “hide-and-seek” mechanisms throughout the space. Whether it’s teaching a parent-child course on How to Steal Cars—”Our belief is that children who learn to steal cars with their parents are more likely to steal cars responsibly when they grow up,” Allen quips—or the storefront’s tree stump dumb waiter that delivers beer, Machine Project transforms the everyday into something simultaneously extraordinary and achievable.

Allen explains, “If you look around wherever you’re sitting there’s a large percentage of things whose workings are totally mysterious: cellphone, tape dispenser, refrigerator, computer. We are surrounded by a material culture where most people remain unaware of how everything that surrounds them is made. Machine Project exists to provide an opportunity for people to understand their built environment, to create a space in which accessibility to knowledge and hands-on, DIY learning experiences can happen right in our own neighborhood.”

This story is part of an editorial series sponsored and inspired by Le Meridien.
New Perspectives explores fresh ideas and distinct points of view in global art and culture.

Due to the popularity of  Melvin, a machine we showed on Dezeen Screen that triggers a chain of strange events when an alarm sounds, this month’s top ten is all about machines. 

A 3D-printer that uses sunlight and sand to make glass objects in the desert by RCA graduate Markus Kayser is the most popular machine by far.

In second place are a set of motorised mirrors that turn to face visitors, wherever they happen to be standing in the room.

Readers were impressed with this set of pedal-powered kitchen gadgets, which comes in at number three.

Next up, a solar-powered machine for making furniture takes fourth place.

In fifth position is a machine powered by a cordless drill to make plastic objects.

This week’s story about an alarm-triggered contraption called Melvin is our sixth most popular machine.

At number seven is an upgrade to the potters wheel that makes clay pots in response to hand movements.

The machine in eighth place is this cake-decorating device, which pipes out icing in a hypotrochoid pattern like a Spirograph toy.

Markus Kayser’s second sunlight-harvesting machine in the top ten is a low-tech, low-energy version of a laser cutter, which takes ninth position.

A device that produces applause at the touch of a button takes the final spot in our top ten.

See you next month for another top ten!

See all of Dezeen’s top ten stories here.

Vienna Design Week 2011: a rotating arm deposits spirals of quartz sand on the showroom floor at crystal company Lobmeyr in Vienna this week, thanks to Canadian designer Philippe Malouin.

The Time Elapsed installation moves in precise hypotrochoid patterns, gradually building up a ring of sand over the course of the week.

Resembling a scaled-up chandelier component, the intricate machine was manufactured by Lobmeyr’s craftsmen in Austria according to Malouin’s design, right down to the detailing of the screw heads.

Malouin collaborated with Lobmeyr as part of the Passionswege project, where Vienna Design Week commissions young designers to collaborate with traditional and highly skilled Viennese companies.

Lobmeyr have participated in Passionswege every year, collaborating with Mark Braun, Claesson Koivisto Rune and Maxim Velčovský in past years.

Vienna Design Week continues until 9 October. See all our stories about the event here.

See all our stories about Malouin’s work, including our own offices, here.

Here are some more details from Malouin:

Time is a quality that makes Lobmeyr so special.

Not only do their glass objects posses timeless designs, independent of changing fashions, but the calibre of the crystal itself means they stand the test of time. Great investments of time are taken in producing and decorating the crystalware, up to 100 hours for a single object, and this investment differentiates Lobmeyr from other glass manufacturers. We have used the theme of time here to illustrate how unique Lobmeyr is.

The flow of sand through an hourglass is traditionally used to keep track of elapsed time. It is also physical representation of the fine line between the past and the future. Through the machine in this room, the deposition of sand forms not minutes and hours on a clock face but abstract and changing patterns, illustrating the link between time and decoration. The sand also holds a physical connection with Lobmeyr, since it is the raw material from which the crystal is created.

See also:

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The Hourglass by Marc Newson for Ikepod	Night Night by Vanessa Hordies	Sand by Yukihiro Kaneuchi