February 27, 2012 by collabcubed - 0 comments

Superflex: Copy Light Factory

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After going through Cindy Sherman’s (the queen of ‘selfies’) new retrospective at the MoMA this past Saturday—an interesting show in itself—I made a quick loop through their other major exhibit next door, Print/Out. Though met with mixed criticism, I have to say, it’s hard for me not to like rooms filled with colorful contemporary graphic prints, posters and books, much of which involve typography, so, I was pretty pleased. But one project that stood out was Danish design studio Superflex’s (coincidentally one of the collaborators on the previously mentioned Superkilen Park in Copenhagen) Copy Light Factory. In this workshop (I was there during non-workshop hours) lamps are created by copying images of well-known lamp designs onto translucent paper and then attaching them to wooden cubed frames. Here is how their website puts it:

Copy Light Factory is a workshop producing Copy Light – cube shaped lamps made of translucent paper with photocopied motifs of various well-known lamp designs. However, the owner is free to change the image to a lamp design of his/her own choosing. Thus Copy Light seeks the borders between the copy and the original. As a copy of a copy Copy Light turns into something new: an original lamp that communicates the problems of the current copyright system.

I loved this idea and will totally be making one for my next apartment.

You can visit Print/Out at the MoMA through May 14, 2012.

Table photo courtesy of Superflex; all others collabcubed.

February 13, 2012 by collabcubed - 1 Comment

Shay Frisch Peri: Energy Fields

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Shay Frisch Peri is an Israeli artist and industrial designer living and working in Rome. Creating an almost weave-like look with the repetition of electrical adaptors and light indicators, Frisch Peri’s light sculptures are like energy fields. The one that Daniela and I saw this past weekend in Chelsea (Campo 4012 N – the circular one with ‘N’ signifying the color black) had a wonderful glow to it as we walked into the gallery. Frisch Peri takes into consideration each individual space and the appropriate proportion of light required.

This piece, as well as Campo 1 N (the individual component used to create the larger work) will be at Haunch of Venison in Chelsea through March 3, 2012. You can see more of Shay Frisch Peri’s work here and here.

February 10, 2012 by collabcubed - 0 comments

Three NYC Architectural Tidbits

Three different projects here in NYC have recently come to my attention, so rather than do three separate posts, I’ve decided to group them together in one. You can click on most of the images to see them larger.

First up, The Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1 have announced this year’s winner of the Young Architects Program. HWKN (HollwichKushner) will construct their entry for the annual outdoor summer installation in PS1’s courtyard in Queens this summer. The winning proposal, titled Wendy, will consist of a large scaffold containing an oversized blue nylon starburst-like structure that will clean the air while offering shade, wind, rain and music. Looks like quite a departure from the past couple of years in that it looks more self-contained. I’m really looking forward to seeing it built in June.

Images courtesy HWKN
via archdaily

Next, right now through February 29, 2012, there’s a 10-foot-tall BIG ❤ NYC sculpture/light installation in Times Square designed by BIG (Bjarke Ingels Group) Architects in honor of Valentine’s Day. The public art installation is located in Duffy Square at the foot of the TKTS steps/seats. Consisting of 400 transparent acrylic tubes (lit by LEDs) that form a cube around a suspended red heart whose beat and color intensity directly correlate to how many people touch the “Touch Me” heart pad on a circular stand close by.

Flatcut fabricated the rods, Silman Associates were the structural engineers and Zumtobel provided LED technology.

You might also want to check out BIG’s winning entry for Wave Pier in St. Petersburg which looks spectacular!

Photos courtesy Times Square Alliance

Lastly, this Greenwich Village townhouse has had us puzzled for the past couple of months on our daily walks past it. In the storefront of what used to be a hair salon now sit two mirrored benches; one a swing the other static. I imagined some sort of new age church or meeting house with funky pews, or some sort of cool, minimalist art gallery, but a few weeks ago I finally had the opportunity to ask a neighbor as she entered her building if she knew what the mirrored benches were all about. Turns out that it’s a private home and the mirrored room (floor, ceiling, walls as well as bench/swing) are all part of the playroom/guest room. This is not your childhood playroom. I’ve been sort of stalking the place (not really, but I do pass by often on my way to and from home) and was able to catch a glimpse of the open guest room, (with its orange mattresses), as well as the super-cool multicolor striped stairs that lead up to the rest of the house. The architects behind the project are Solomonoff Architecture Studio and professional photos of the entire project are due out in an undisclosed architecture periodical shortly, which should look a lot better than these (the reflective space is especially difficult to photograph.) I’m curious to see what the rest of the house looks like…

Photos: collabcubed

February 9, 2012 by collabcubed - 3 Comments

The James Turrell Museum in Argentina

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Well, this is certainly news to me. Definitely will be placed on a must-see list next time I visit my relatives in Argentina. The James Turrell Museum opened a couple of years ago within Estancia Colomé and its winery in northern Argentina, near Salta. The museum belongs to the Hess Art Collection and is fully devoted to Turrell’s work; all light and space. Fifty years worth of work are exhibited in nine rooms within a 1,700-meter space.

A winery and a James Turrell museum in one location? Sounds like a nice combination, to me.

More Turrell here and here

Photos: Welcome Argentina; Wallpaper; Florian Holzherr, WSJ

via welcome argentina

February 7, 2012 by collabcubed - 0 comments

Glow by We Make Carpets

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We Make Carpets (previously here and here) the Dutch collective that creates contemporary interpretations of the centuries-old medium, recently put together a Glow Carpet for the Glow Festival in Eindhoven, The Netherlands.

Consisting of 750 kilogram glow-in-the-dark pebble stones, the carpet was charged with bright light for five minutes every ten so that when the lights were turned off, the luminescent carpet, well…glowed!

February 7, 2012 by collabcubed - 0 comments

Preservation is Life: Bryan McCormack

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Continuing with the escalator theme, here’s an installation by Irish artist Bryan McCormack that was at the Centre Pompidou in Paris a couple of months back. Preservation of Life: Les sons de la vie—as the sound and light installation was called—started at the museum’s façade and continued up its famous 6-floor escalator as part of the art center’s AIDS annual fundraising campaign. 80,000 condom covered light bulbs in different colors, with hues changing on every floor, were used to form a condom tapestry. Accompanying the dramatic tunnel visuals was audio of a human heartbeat, with the pulse changing along with the colors, starting at the base with the cardiac rhythm of a fetus in the womb and progressing at every level, to a newborn baby’s heartbeat and, finally, to the artist’s own heartbeat on the top floor.

Though I didn’t see it written anywhere, I’m pretty sure that the title is a pun. In French, and in Spanish, preservatif, and preservativo, mean condom.

You can buy one of the condom bulbs here.

Photos courtesy of the artist; Bertrand Guay/AFP; and Xinhua

via coolhunting via notcot

January 24, 2012 by collabcubed - 12 Comments

Doug Wheeler: SA MI 75 DZ NY 12

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After making a special trip with Em on Saturday, in the snowy cold, to see Doug Wheeler’s light installation titled SA MI 75 DZ NY 12 at the David Zwirner Gallery, we left promptly due to the crowded waiting area we descended upon and the one-hour wait ahead of us — I’m often deluded into thinking that I’m the only one who has these great ideas in NYC…but really, who goes to Chelsea on a frigid, snowy weekend? Apparently: a lot of people. — So, today, a Tuesday afternoon, I thought I’d quickly pop in but, alas, there would be no popping in. There was still a half-hour wait but, seating was available and the musical-chairs-style line kept me active.

Now, back to the exhibit: Amazing. The bright white light installation is the closest thing to what, I imagine, standing in a cloud might feel like. The first impression is that of a flat wall created by light. As one reluctantly steps forward—wearing the white booties provided by the gallery to keep things pristine—it feels as though you’re stepping into the void. The minute the light box is entered, all depth perception disappears. There’s a dense fog-like effect that’s created with light and white paint. The walls have been curved and the lack of hard lines or horizon intensifies the confusing sensation. The result is at first a little unsettling, but the incredible coolness instantly follows. The light in the box fluctuates emulating the light of day, from dawn to dusk, in a 32-minute loop.

If you’re in New York, you might want to check it out. Doug Wheeler’s installation is on view at David Zwirner through February 25, 2012. I recommend a weekday, if possible, for a shorter wait.

Photos courtesy of David Zwirner; Carolina A. Miranda; and soulellis’ flickr.

January 24, 2012 by collabcubed - 0 comments

Brian Tolle: Tempest

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New York artist Brian Tolle creates sculptures and installations that are iconographic with history or context in mind. The Tempest, located in Collins Park in front of Miami Beach’s Bass Museum, is one such installation. A sort of maze, made of powder coated aluminum, fiberglass, and LEDs, this permanent, site-specific sculpture appears as an island of tumultuous waves and invites the viewer to participate in the movement by walking through the maze.

The night view is quite spectacular, adding a glowing phosphorescent quality to the fiberglass water.

You can see more of Brian Tolle’s work at his website, including the Irish Hunger Memorial here in NYC and his more recent Simnai Dirdro (Twisted Chimney) in Wales. Coming this year, an installation that looks like two elevated statues on a lamp post that glow at night on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn.

Photos courtesy of the artist and wallyg’s flickr

via CRG

January 19, 2012 by collabcubed - 0 comments

SKIN: Pavilion of Knowledge

The Pavilion of Knowledge in Lisbon is an interactive science and economy museum. The design firm P-06 Atelier, in collaboration with architect João Luís Carrilho da Graça, created a “skin” with a state of the art touch transforming the space into a playful and evocative landscape, employing a perfect mix of bold graphics, tactile patterns and typography.

The moveable walls have the American Standard Code for Information Interchange cut out of them as an analogy for the museum’s intention of sharing information. Through the different sized stencils, both noise and the white LED light are filtered differently at different points of SKIN.

I’d love to see this in person. Looks like a great effect.

via red dot design

January 6, 2012 by collabcubed - 0 comments

Devon Boathouse: Elliott + Associates

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I must confess that I don’t know anything about Oklahoma City, but it seems there is a very nice riverfront district that has been undergoing redevelopment over the past several years with three boathouses and a high-performance center in the Regatta District alone. All architecturally interesting, the newest of these boathouses is the Devon Boathouse completed in 2011. Home to the Oklahoma City University Rowing and Canoe/Kayak teams as well as the headquarters for the OKC National High Performance Center, the Devon Boathouse, designed by Rand Elliott of Elliott + Associates Architects, makes for a striking image against the downtown skyline. Its sharp corner creates the impression of a “prow” breaking against the river’s edge.

Expansive windows make for soaring spaces, created by glass and polycarbonate walls, which are flooded with natural light and views. Blue LED lights light up the boathouse at night, adding another dimension to the already dramatic building.

In its 33,000 sq. feet, the boathouse includes reception, event spaces, catering facilities, high performance fitness center, propulsion rowing tank, endless pool, high altitude training room, weight room and locker rooms as well as boat storage and repair area.

Photos courtesy of the Elliott + Associates, Michael Stano, Ryan Fogle, Timberlake Construction, Allied Arts, and Boathouse District

via Michael Stano’s flickr

January 5, 2012 by collabcubed - 1 Comment

Roof Top Lights

This is such a clever idea, especially ideal for the many dark New York City apartments out there. Roof Top Lights, by Lightboys, are large-format illuminated photographs mounted on an ultra-thin housing that contains LEDs. Suddenly, you not only have an overhead light, but a skylight or church dome or treetops, even a disco ball, right over your head, as well! To quote their website “These are images which not only open up rooms, but also hearts and minds…”