4 April – 15 July 2018 La Gaîté Lyrique in Paris, FR
2 October - 21 October 2018 Cinekid Festival in Amsterdam, NL
1 November - 10 November 2018 KIKK Festival in Namur, BE
January 2019 WOELAB in Lomé, TG

Our design lab's MATHEMAGIC building blocks star in the interactive art installation “Edge of Chaos”, that invites visitors to cross boundaries and experience the balance point between highly ordered and turbulent systems. The “Edge of Chaos” installation mimics the design process of the future, where new materials, technology and ideas will emerge from turbulent processes and where artificial intelligence plays a major role. It tells a story about our technological world and it induces a collaborative culture that allows the active participation of children and the co-constructing of creative knowledge: learning by experimenting together.

“Edge of Chaos” is a collaboration between scientist Bas Overvelde AMOLF and Studio Overvelde and artists Vasilija Abramovic & Ruairi Glynn Interactive Architecture Lab, Bartlett UCL. The installation brings together the scientific work on transformable geometries previously published by Overvelde et al. in Nature and Interactive Architecture Lab’s expertise in immersive spatial design and interaction. The team collaborated on developing their competition winning entry (selected from 170 entries originating 106 countries) for the international touring exhibition Capitaine Futur, which opened in Paris at La Gaîté Lyrique on the 4th April.

The interactive installation “Edge of Chaos” is composed of three features. At its centre, a robotic tree representing “Life”, surrounded by an inert “Cloud” representing the vast unorganised matter of an entropic universe, and an interactive surface that represents the “Edge of Chaos”. The robotic tree and concept formation behind the installation was developed by the Interactive Architecture Lab designers, harnessing passive and active geometries that incorporate over 25.000 MATHEMAGIC building blocks designed and developed by our studio. The interactive surface and its emergent behaviours were developed between the labs at AMOLF, Amsterdam, and Bartlett UCL, London celebrating creative possibilities of collaborating across science, art and design.

The installation narrates the science of materials and complexity to children and adults alike, demonstrating its behaviour through sound, light and robotic motion, encouraging playful exploration of worlds to come.  Just like Mort Weisinger’s space-traveling scientist and adventurer traveler: Capitaine Futur.

CREDITS

Artists: Vasilija Abramovic, Ruairi Glynn and Bas Overvelde
Interactive Architecture Lab, UCL [UK], AMOLF / Studio Overvelde [NL].
Co-produced by: La Gaîté Lyrique, KIKK Festival, Cinekid Festival and WOELAB.
Photography: STUDIO OVERVELDE, Max Kneefel.
Video: STUDIO OVERVELDE, 5 Graden Oost.
Sound design: Emmett Glynn.
STUDIO OVERVELDE Paris and Amsterdam team: Sanne Overvelde-Slagman.
AMOLF Paris and Amsterdam team: Dennis Kistemaker, Niels Commandeur, Giorgio Oliveri, Agustin Iniguez, Luuk van Laake, Davide Bray.
IALab Paris team: Naomi Li, Parker Heyl, Marguerite Tricaud, Ronan Glynn.
Special Thanks to: Dirk-Jan Spaanderman, Soft Robotic Matter Group, Enrico Cacciapuoti, Hui sim Chan, Marianna Chrapana, Parvin Farahzadeh, Buse Gurbuz, Dhruv Kumar, Alexandra Niaka, Isabella Ong, Pawimol Samsen, Oliver Townsend, Michael Wagner, Sana Yamaguchi, Min Zhang.

RELATED WORSHOPS

20 December 2017 WOELAB in Lomé, TG
7,14, 18 April 2018 La Gaîté Lyrique in Paris, FR (Superfleur - Faire des trucs: construits ton robot en origami)
16, 30 June & 7 July 2018 La Gaîté Lyrique in Paris, FR (Arbre interactive - Faire des trucs: Fabrique des fruits connectés
)