Digital Wabi Sabi...

Above and Below: The Plinth Vase...

 There's something tactile, seductive, almost endearing about some of the process-based 'failures' or mistakes that occasionally occur in something fabricated through digital means. Such faux-pas are seldom acknowledged, or are quickly brushed under the carpet, in most discussions relating to things made through either subtractive, additive, or even formative methods of CAD based making. The CAD-CAM (Buildware) methods are, after all, supposed to bring forth a new dawn of projects and work that allow and provide means for artists, architects and designers to retain control of their work from conception to conclusion, and do so through an optimized process in which logistical faults, omissions and inaccuracies are minimized, if not removed. For most of us who use such means daily, however, the 'misprints' are the norm rather than the exception. 

The included designs provide a case for celebrating such aforementioned deviations. They demonstrate that there is an inherent craft component in CAD-CAM based fabrication processes (an allowance for a subjective interpretation) that, in their own right, routinely catalyze (form based, textural, various sensorial) outcomes affecting and resulting in more dynamic and multi-faceted designs. 

More images included on our website, accessed by clicking here...

Above and Below: Two renditions of the 'Nouveau' Vase...

Contemp Art '14 Conference - Digital Wabi-Sabi - Exploring the Values of 'Imperfection' in CAD/CAM Based Making of Artifacts...

The Contemp Art '14 Conference in Istanbul has now concluded… It was a great pleasure to attend, hear many a worthy presentation, and meet interesting individuals, from all around the world.

Included below is my submission abstract:

Digital Wabi-Sabi - Exploring the Values of 'Imperfection' in CAD/ CAM Based Making of Artifacts

Author: Thomas Modeen PhD

Abstract

There's something tactile, seductive, almost endearing about some of the process-based 'failures' or mistakes that occasionally occur in something fabricated through digital means. Such faux-pas are seldom acknowledged, or are quickly brushed under the carpet, in most discussions relating to things made through either subtractive, additive, or even formative methods of CAD based making. The CAD-CAM (Buildware) methods are, after all, supposed to bring forth a new dawn of projects and work that allow and provide means for artists, architects and designers to retain control of their work from conception to conclusion, and do so through an optimized process in which logistical faults, omissions and inaccuracies are minimized, if not removed. For most of us who use such means daily, however, the 'misprints' are the norm rather than the exception.

This presentation will provide a case for celebrating such aforementioned deviations. It will demonstrate, through showing a number of related projects, that there is an inherent craft component in CAD-CAM based fabrication processes (an allowance for a subjective interpretation) that, in their own right, routinely catalyze (form based, textural, various sensorial) outcomes affecting and resulting in more dynamic and multi-faceted designs.

Presentation in action (Photo by Jesse Payne)

Design Interrupted and Meat & Bone Trays...

A few images of a set of small, FDM made, trays that all take advantage of some of the particular idiosyncrasies affiliated with the FDM process... Here the Meat & Bone technique (where the usually removed support structures are allowed to become an inherent part of the final design), as well as the Design Interrupted method (in which the digital file of the design is modeled with a stretch of extra, residual, build in the Z axis to allow the model to appear and work as a completed piece once interrupted mid-build), have both been used and even combined in their realization...  

All the included designs fit within the roughly 20 X 20 by 20 centimeter build frame of the FDM machine we have access to... 

 Above and Below: The Stratum Tray, that uses the Meat & Bone technique in its realization. 

 Screen image of the digital file for the Stratum Tray showing the, here floating, layers up to which the support materials were automatically constructed by the software...

 Image of the Stratum Tray being built...

Video of the Stratum Tray being built...

 Above and Below: Images of the Deco Tray. This design uses both the Design Interrupted and the Meat & Bone method in its realization...

 Above and Below: The Tooth Gum Tray. An early design using the Meat & Bone FDM technique...

The 3 - 3D - 3 Plan at the F for Faculty Exhibition at VCUQ, Qatar...

A few images from my contribution to the F for Faculty exhibition at VCUQ... 

The exhibit presents a set of three projects, realized using of FDM (Fused Deposition Modeling) - a 3D printing technology, in three different scales... All designs take advantage and explore the technology's inherent, both conceptual (CAD based) and physical (material/ fabrication based) attributes and peculiarities... 

All displayed designs were fabricated at the VCUQ FabLab...

For more examples exhibited at the gallery please click here... 

The F for Faculty exhibition concludes on January 21...

 The 1:50, 1:10 and 1:1 display pedestals

 Tom at 1:1, 1:10 and 1:50 (Photo by Ben Jurgensen)

Close up of Tom at 1:10 

Close up of Tom at 1:50 

 The Castle Vase from the Meat & Bone series

The Interrupted Vase and Pitcher 

A 1:1 tray (to be featured in more detail in a future submission) using both the Meat & Bone and Design Interrupted techniques 

The 1:10 model of the Book-Corner-Seat

A 1:10 model of the Grid Shelving/ Seat/ Partition unit (currently unbuilt) 

Above and Below: A 1:50 model for a pavilion design for the La Fontaine Art Center in Manama. The roof grid accommodates a set of wooden profiles that can be adjusted according to season/ pavilion function/ whim... More of the design in a future blog submission...

Meat & Bone Vases and Bowls...

A few additional examples from the Meat & Bone series - where the usually discarded/ removed, but in its own right quite strong (if brittle) and beautiful, FDM support material is allowed to perform the role of a protagonist in the final design. Also, as in the previous submissions, here the different software based settings for distributing the supports are used as design components, i.e. the 'white bits' (made of ABS plastic) are distributed and the supports are allowed to 'grow' up to brace them - consequently the somewhat funky shapes of the brown bits...

An additional engaging quality about these designs is that, in a way, they openly acknowledge, even celebrate a bit, the slight degrees of unpredictability and randomness, even 'imperfections' (in a wab-sabi sort of way) of the digital fabrication processes, which still all too often are considered as almost faultless - 'we can make almost anything' - kinds of machines/ fabricators... These designs aim not to do that, but instead take a step back, and try to recognize the true material, sensory (textural, aural, olfactory, proprioceptive, etc.) digital & virtual, thrills and seductive qualities affiliated with making things through the various Buildware/ CAD-CAM processes... 

More related submissions to come in the future...

 The Meat & Bone (M&B/ MaB) Castle Vase...

The CAD (Catalyst Ex 4.2) version of the Castle Vase...

 The MaB Wing-Commander Vase/ Bowl...

The MaB Ring Bowl... 

Buildware Morandi...

An initial design related submission from the 'Meat & Bone' series of buildware fabricated artifacts. All of these designs have been made through the FDM (Fused Deposition Modeling) process, in which the usually discarded (or diluted away) support material (the dark brown sections of the designs) is included as an inherent component in the completed design. In this instance the various software based settings for how such supports are distributed (with names such as, 'basic', 'smart', or 'sparse') are also played with, resulting in a variety of different shapes and applications of such supports (i.e. the brown bits were't directly modeled, but the Rhino made main shapes - fabricated of ivory white ABS plastic - were positioned within the model and build-frame so as to 'allow' the support material algorithms to 'fill' the gap according to the aforementioned settings)... 

This initial set was, in a roundabout way, inspired by Giorgio Morandi's paintings... 

More 'Meat & Bone' designs in future blog-submissions...