Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Wednesday Wonder: 'Strandbeests'

Using plastic yellow tubes and lemonade bottles, Dutch kinetic sculptor Theo Jansen is "creating new forms of life" that need no food, understand where they are and can "detect" the presence of water, which is their enemy. They are creatures that "walk on the wind" and, Jansen says, he wants to populate Holland's beaches with "herds" of his self-propelling, ultimate self-surviving, "Strandbeests", including his Animaris Gubernare, Siamesis (2010), Umeris (2009), and Ordis (2007), among others, which he demonstrates in videos (also found on Vimeo) and explains here

The creativity, ingenuity, and technical brilliance behind these creations astound.

Here's a short film of Jansen's Animaris Umerus at Scheveningen, Netherlands, in 2009:


Animaris Umerus from Alexander Schlichter on Vimeo.


Theo Jansen TED Talk (2007; 8:16 minutes):



Strandbeesten Documentary: Bio-Fiction Video from Synthetic Biology Science, Art, and Film Festival

1 comment:

Louise Gallagher said...

Wow -- what amazing creativity and imagination! Spectacular! At first I thought it was the Strandbeesten making the noises though -- which would have been cool too as that music is haunting.