LABORAL - CENTRO DE ARTE Y CREACIÓN INDUSTRIAL

SOLITUDE / THE ONE / THE SELF / SEDUCTION / MEMENTO

 GREETJE VAN HELMOND Unsustainable, 2007

In present day life we can say that we consume a lot. Durable materials are often used for the production of goods that are typically replaced or thrown away quickly. Contrary to this, Greetje van Helmond uses everyday basic materials to create products that appear valuable and sustainable. Because of the materials she uses, the products do not last long, but long enough to stay “new”. She creates jewellery out of sugar: sugar has the quality of growing into crystals under special circumstances. By controlling the process she allows crystals to grow around strings to form accessories. With a lot of time and effort she believes one can turn apparently banal and cheap materialsinto something beautiful.

www.greetjevanhelmond.com

BRUCE BELL Kitchen Architecture MK 2, 2008

Bruce Bell’s artworks are experiments in scale and its distortion. They challenge our perception of the miniature
when placed in a full scale context and explore the boundaries between objects in the designed environment:
when does a model become a product, its own entity, or architecture cease to relate to building? Children instinctively create environments for play that are less defined in terms of scale than the spaces we create in the adult world. Similarly, these models play with architecture, creating spatial forms without the complications of practicalities such as planning, cost, structural concerns or use. Kitchen Architecture follows a similar theme: its shelves are stacked like multi-storey car parks.

www.willsonandbell.co.uk

DANIEL CHARNY & GABRIEL KLASMER Sports Furniture (2008, basado en una versión fotográfica de 2003)

Furniture is often thought of as given types that relate to a task or support an occasion. Sports Furniture is about choreographing the body into dramatic physical situations, such as those of footballers at the height of exerted effort. Their shape frozen by photography becomes a heroic depiction of human form. Good sports photography captures these moments that are so full of energy and human expression. The body in relation to the ball becomes a study of intent. These supports are the exact opposite of the transient sport moment; they offer the user an imaginative scenario in which they can place themselves in that heroic moment.

www.danielcharny.com

DASH MACDONALD Imagine Being a World Leader, 2008

Staged around a scaled podium and the accompanying paraphernalia of a political event, Imagine Being a World Leader uses the fictitious “Summit for World Change 2008” to create the framework for a role-play exercise that teaches primary school children leadership and public speaking skills. Led by a professional public speaking coach (Ysabel Clare), the workshop and accompanying exercise book incorporate a variety of exercises tailored to teach children key rhetoric rules, body language and voice projection; all “vital tools” widely used by
leaders in the art of successful persuasion. By breaking down these techniques into a series of engaging exercises which arm primary school pupils with the same set of skills, the workshop becomes a vehicle to address the artifice behind the methods used by politicians, public leaders and figures of authority, to persuade and win over an audience. The children become the medium through which the viewer can gain a novel insight and re-examine these set mechanisms of control, while at the same time bringing to the children an awareness of how the use of the spoken word can shape their lives.

www.show2008.rca.ac.uk/Default.aspx?ContentID=501707&GroupID=501053&

LAURA POTTER My Life in a Sock Drawer, 2007

This project examines the potential for designers to engage with the emotional significance of objects by focusing on the storage of sentimental jewellery. It traces the relationship between unworn jewellery and identity, and the means by which women use jewellery to access and evidence their life experiences. In light of this, the research proposes alternatives to conventional storage boxes. Primary information was gathered during interviews with a selection of women and this was used to guide practical design processes such as drawing and modelling. Consequently a series of object outcomes were produced. These new “containers” are intended to reflect and augment certain types of interaction uncovered during the interviews. The project provides new insights into the psychology of storage and constitutes a fertile design strategy. It was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

http://homepages.gold.ac.uk/laurapotter/

ÓSCAR NARUD Greedy Bastard, 2005

The project came about when prompted to build something exploring the abilities of Rapid Prototyping technology, in principle a 3D printer that reads CAD files and lays down successive layers of liquid or powder, and in this way builds up the model from a series of cross sections. The advantage is that you can create complex structures that cannot be replicated in any other industrial process. The Greedy Bastard exploits this fully through a set of hollow internal passages and cavities restricted in its “path” only by its outer shell. The actual object is a character that is to be played as a 3D maze. You feed him small ball bearings only to then safely navigate them through his body, avoiding pitfall cavities and wrong turns in the duodenum only to “exit” at the other end. The character is accompanied by a little cartoon to create a story around him.

www.oscarnarud.com

PAUL COCKSEDGE Styrene Lampshade, 2003

Styrene Lampshade was inspired by the concept of growth as a process. By applying heat to polystyrene, the form changes and with it the properties of the material. The results are organic and uniquely sculptural forms with much greater strength.

www.paulcocksedge.co.uk

TITHI KUTCHAMUCH

Ordinary Mould, 2007

Ordinary Mould is an aluminium cake mould with a difference. To begin with, the resulting cake will look like an ordinary home-made cake. Only when you cut or slice the cake in order to share or to eat it will the heart shape be revealed. For the moment of sharing.

My Sweets, 2007

“I buy Twix extra because it’s only 10p more expensive than the regular one. I finish it in one go, and feel guilty for the rest of the day”. Bargain food persuades people by playing with the value of money, which has brought a lot of problems to society: over nutrition, eating disorders, obesity, illness, guilt, wasting food, wasting resources, over production. Can design make people buy food that offers LESS?

www.tithi.info

YURI SUZUKI

Sound Chaser, 2008

A train-style record player. Users can connect chipped pieces of records and then make, in both senses, a new track. The records used are bought at jumble sales or at used record shops; the record player revives the forgotten, old records.

Sound Jewellery, 2008

In collaboration with Linda Brothwell and Caren Hartley (GSMJ Royal College of Art).
This project was inspired by the following question: “How can sound have a physical value?”
Sound grooves are etched into the necklace, bracelet and brooch. The sounds can include precious memories, such as the laughter of someone with their grandma, a telephone conversation with a girlfriend, or recordings during travels/holidays.

www.yurisuzuki.com

STUDIO GLITHERO Panta Rei (Everything Flows), 2008

Panta Rei is a mechanical candle making an installation. A simple configuration of familiar elements: string, eyelets, buckets, heaters, wax and a motorised CAM arm. As the arm turns on the ceiling, one by one lengths of wick are lowered into buckets of molten blue wax, building up a thin layer each time. A candle slowly emerges. The work is part performance, part production process; a web of strings in a constantly evolving cycle of ceiling geometry, methodically raising and lowering wicks in a wave-like motion. When a complete harvest is formed, a fresh batch of wicks can begin. In Studio Glithero’s work, the machines share the stage with the products they produce. As their inventors, Studio Glithero act as choreographers of timing and movement. The final products are literally out of their hands.

http://studioglithero.com/

NOAM TORAN & NICK WILLIAMSON Bra Machine, 2007

Bra Machine is a fictional teaching aid designed to instruct adolescent boys to overcome the intricacies of opening the brassiere. When initiated, the machine demonstrates the principles of both clasp disengagement and brassiere removal. Following a short pause, the machine then re-secures the bra ready for the next demonstration. The project was originally inspired by accounts of repressive post-war institutionalised sex education, but is meant to serve as a future artifact, demonstrating an obsolete behaviour brought about by developments in bio-technology and plastic surgery.

www.noamtoran.com