Beginning in June, 2005, a vortex-shaped outdoor architectural installation made of 286 panels of mylar-carbon laminate will grace the outdoor gallery of the Materials and Applications Research Center in Silver Lake, Los Angeles.

Designed by Sci-Arc alumni Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues, the installation is designed to warp the flow of outdoor space with a feather-weight rendition of "the deadliest force in the Universe." Constructed in tinted mylar resembling stained glass, the shade structure is part Twenty-First century tensile engineering and part tribute to Disney Studio's sci-fi cult film The Black Hole. It swirls above the outdoor gallery all summer long, providing post-Shuttle space-age relief from the noonday sun.

The aesthetic effects, materials and digital fabrication processes that make up the structure are borrowed from the high-tech sail making industry. (The mylar-carbon laminate offers both UV resistance and high strength.) An assembly composed of 286 unique instances of a single but parametrically variable component, the canopy's extreme intricacy and repetitiveness pay homage to actor Maximilian Schell's character 'Dr. Reinhardt' in The Black Hole, a tyrant who wishes to harness the "power of the vortex" and possess "the great truth of the unknown!"

Benjamin Ball is an architect and former production designer. Gaston Nogues is an architect and a product designer at Frank Gehry Partners. They design objects and environments using a combination of hand-made prototypes and sophisticated digital design and fabrication tools.

More info: www.emanate.org

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Date Posted: April 30, 2005
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