My favorite piece though was by uhuru. They took a new pass at one of their signature pieces, the Stoolen.
The original Stoolen is scrap wood beautifully formed into a cylinder with a found bicycle rim holding it all together. uhuru’s latest is the Metal Stoolen. Made of leftover steel lengths arranged in a similar pattern. The steel fills up the empty space of the wooden Stoolen. Beautiful design, way to keep working on a great idea.
Last night I went to the littleBits launch party at Eyebeam. littleBits is an open source project that is trying “to end the mysticism around engineering and electronics, to counter the black box product ideology of consumer electronics, and to fuel an explosion of creativity and innovation in artists, designers, kids and hobbyists. The release of littleBits Version 1 on April 30, 2009, will be unique in that it is a growing library of circuit boards preassembled by tiny magnets—the first of its kind. littleBits requires absolutely no programming, no prior knowledge and no hardware or software set-up. Just snap and play!”
This video might explain it a little more clearly.
The stuff is great and I can’t wait to get my hands on some. I could’ve really used it on some of the props I’ve worked on in the past (here and here). The party was held at Eyebeam. “Eyebeam is an art and technology center that provides a fertile context and state-of-the-art tools for digital research and experimentation.” It’s in a very cool space in Chelsea.
Sorry for the bad pictures. In my defense, I’m a horrible photographer.
I met Tony Nemyer’s (the staff pick winner) father-in-law at the show. Very nice guy. He got Tony on the phone and my sister (who had a couple of glasses of champagne) proceeded to chat to him for some time. Open bar.
The laser cutter is such a cool tool. To be able to design something and have the final piece in your hands 10 minutes later, it’s like living in the future.
All of the designs from the class are posted at thingivers.com. So if you have access to a laser cutter, you can make your own trees.
There is a very cool art exhibit in Madison Square Park, Pulse Park by Rafael Lozano-Hemmer. Since I won’t be able to explain it any better, here is what the Madison Square Park Conservancy had to say about it:
Visitors’ heart rates will be monitored by two heart rate sensor sculptures, and will activate two hundred theatrical spotlights, creating a pulsating matrix of light across the central Oval Lawn of the historic park.
I went to the Cupcake Decorating Championship last night, part of Ignite NYC. It was a lot of fun, people came up with some great stuff. I went with a My Name is Earl cupcake, mostly because I had a circuit board that says “Hi, my name is Earl.” I think I ripped it out of a magazine or something.
Saw Anish Kapoor’s exhibit at the Gladstone Gallery. There are only four pieces there but they are so much fun. Basically, they’re fun house mirrors and you act like a face-making 10 year old.
Last Friday turned out to be a pretty fantastic day. I had a half day at the office so I thought I would check out David Byrne’sPlaying the Building. The exhibit was great. Playing the organ was a lot of fun and the building was incredible. If this video doesn’t make you want to see it, then nothing I say will.
From outside of the building that you can play, you can see three of the waterfalls in the new Waterfalls exhibit. I’m sure the best way to see these would be from a boat, but since I was boat-less at the time, I figured I would just take some crappy far away shots.
After the waterfalls, it was uptown to the Metropolitan Museum Sculpture Garden. Home of some of the best views in New York (and home of some expensive drinks). There are currently 3 sculptures by Jeff Koons on the roof, Balloon Dog (Yellow) was by far my favorite. I know it’s made of steel, but it really looks like a giant balloon dog.
And to cap it all off, the Superheroes: Fashion and Fantasy exhibit in the Met. They have the Superman suit from the original Christopher Reeve’s movie, Linda Carter’s Wonder Woman suit, both the red/blue and black Spider Man suits from the movies, even the Dark Knight Batman armor. But the most impressive was the silver Iron Man armor from the recent movie. It looked like it could fly and take on heavy gun fire. By comparison, the rest of the costumes just looked like rubber and spandex. The comic books with all the first appearances of the superheroes were also on display. Action Comics #1, Detective Comics #27, Amazing Fantasy #15, Tales of Suspense #39… Ok, now I’m just geeking out.
Just a typical New York afternoon, I love this city.
