Now Showing at the
Friedman Benda Gallery
515 West 26th Street
New York
March 4 – April 10, 2010
The Bone Chair — if evolution could create a chair…
If furniture could evolve in the same was as our bones evolved, then the result we would see could be fascinating and also be almost optimal. Joris Laarman used optimization models to generate furniture that mimicked evolution. In collaboration with Droog, Friedmanbenda and Opel, he put together a body of work that was simply amazing.
Paper Starlings — paper planes autonomously flying in a gracious organic ballet
Originally designed for the Guggenheim museum as part of the contemplating the void exhibition, paper starlings is an interactive installation in which paper planes autonomously fly in a organic pattern guided by a gps system. Still in development, the planes are motorized by micro robots. They interact with the audience interference and charge themselves as they hit the ground.
Half Life Lamp — lamp is half made of living organism and non living material
This lamp is half made of living organism and non living material. It was created on February 23 in a Dutch tissue culture laboratory. The cells responsible for the emission of light in the hood of the lamp are originally stem from a Chinese hamster. In 1957 these cells were isolated from its ovary and kept alive as a cell culture for research purposes. These cells glow in the dark in presence of luciferine.
Heat Wave — functional rococo radiator
Joris Larman challenges the notion ‘form follows function’ and achieves a spectacular design solution to a common household problem. This intriguing modular heating system is the first to unite the fine details of craftsmanship with industrial efficiency. The result is an expressive design with a maximum amount of surface to release warmth. It achieves a curious and paradoxical compromise between design and functionality.
www.jorislaarman.com/
www.friedmanbenda.com/artists/joris-laarman/
A peek into the future – Google’s Goggles
The way we search the web is set to be revolutionized by including methods such as image recognition in our search. The first steps seems to have been taken. Meet Google’s new visual search engine, Goggles which lets you search by using a image captured by your phone camera.
Already a working app on the Andriod, it would soon reach the iPhone app store and other smartphones. Till now search has worked by matching tags that describe the webpage. The intelligent algorithms then would scourge and give you the best possible results for your search. Taking this a step further, voice search converts words (input as voice) into text and then searches the web.
Image recognition works by matching features and not words, which would be a huge leap in search technology. These matches are than used to give descriptions and even matching to tags. As this is just the beginning, the potential applications and implication would be immense. The first steps seems to be taken by google, but if others get onto this bandwagon and combine it with query based searches, we would see a new leader emerge. And that would have Mountain View on its toes.
Lets wait and watch.
For more information go to http://www.google.com/mobile/goggles/#landmark
Download Layar onto your phone and hold your phone in-front of you like a camera and what it shows you is digital information on top of reality through the camera of your phone.
Not only will this app let you get information on what’s around you right now, but you could also view what an upcoming architectural masterpiece may look like, or it could take you back in time and let you re-live history – making your travels a lot more fun.
(Image Above) Renowned architects MVRDV are currently working on a public market project in Rotterdam which is scheduled for completion in 2014. With LAYAR, people can already see what this structure is going to look like.
(Image Above) You could go down “Abbey Road” in London and see the Beatles by pointing your phone to the zebra-crossing!
(Image Above) Various artists are creating new art and new ways for people to interact with their work.
And the cool part of this app is that it is user generated – so people with basic programming skills could create a Layar for people to experience.
Layar and other augmented reality apps are a new avenue for marketers and advertisers to explore.
While the Prius seems to be one of the move well-known eco-friendly cars, it has been criticized for the pollution is causes during production. While Toyota admits it does require more to produce the cars, Toyota also states that within a year of a car’s life, the car’s low-emissions offset the difference.
The truly amazing thing, however, is how eco-friendly the Prius factory, located in Toyota City, Japan, really is, and to what extent Toyota has gone to make it so.
Toyota has just announced they have engineered two flower species (to be grown at the factory) to help lower the production costs even more: One plant absorbs harmful gases released during production, and another reduces water vapors, which lowers the outside temperature, which then requires less cooling efforts internally in the production plant.
While this is quite impressive, they also have other very impressive green features at the plant: specially-engineered grass that needs to only be cut once a year, solar panels on the roofs, mirrors to shine sunlight into rooms, and special paint on the building to absorb harmful gases.
All in all, a very impressive effort by Toyota!
Original info was found on the New York Times.
MoMA has created this cool new app for the iPhone, Geo Art. When activated is uses gps to track your movements around the city and outputs a linear Frank-Gehry-like design. When you are happy with the design, you can upload it to the MoMA. They will print it out as a poster and tag it with their logo, the date and the line “art is everywhere.”
I’ve looked for the app but can’t seem to find it. Let me know if you track it down.
I’ve been using Zipcar for about half a year now, and from day one they have had not only fantastic branding across all their platforms (the cars, website, mailers, happy hour meetups they arrange, and keycard used to unlock the car), they have also made using their service nearly effortless.
While it seems like it may have taken longer than expected for a hip, online company like Zipster, they finally came out with an iPhone app that is simply amazing. In brief, it can locate where you are, find the nearest Zipcar garages and/or specific cars, let you extend time you rent the car on the go, provide directions to return your car, give you one-touch access to Zipcar to report any problems, and perhaps the coolest, it lets you lock/unlock/honk the horn of the car you rent on the app.
Anyone with a Zipcar membership and an iPhone needs this app.
