Plantoid

Plantoid is a bionic blockchain-based installation. Plantoid, the plant equivalent of an android, is an autopoietic sculpture —a self-owned artist that owns and finances itself, and eventually reproduces itself. It is, in essence, a hybrid entity that exists both in the physical and virtual world, where it can interact with other entities on the blockchain. It was first displayed at STWST during the Ars Electronica festival of 2015

•   STWST / Ars Electronica (Linz)4 September - 7 September 2015

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  In its physical form, it is a welded mechanical sculpture on display in a public space, an aesthetic ornaments that exhibits its mechanical beauty and begs to be appreciated by the public. Appreciation is done via interactions with the public who can "tip or feed" the Plantoid by sending tokens into its Bitcoin wallet.
  Legally speaking, Plantoids do not have any legal entity, since (as opposed to corporations) the law does not recognize legal personhood to commodities or things. Yet, as opposed to traditional art pieces, Plantoids are not bought or sold; nor can they be owned as objects. Even if they are autonomous, Plantoids require the interaction of other species (humans) to subsist and reproduce themselves in a physical form. Reproduction of a Plantoid is enabled through human participation, coordinated via smart contracts and blockchain technology. Thanks to the fund she has secured beforehand, the Plantoid can pay humans to design a new blueprint, gather materials, and prepare, collate, weld, or assemble them, so as to ultimately deliver a new structure for every new instantiation of the Plantoid, with a new life on its own. Although (partially) defined by the contractual rules of the DAO, the actual phenotype of subsequent Plantoids remains open to artistic interpretation, depending on the artist hired to reproduce the sculpture..

Fusion Ball

A large metallic Hamster-ball designed to interact with several humanoids. As the Ball rolls on the ground, activated by human-power, it will provide a platform to perform theater, music and interactive pranks. The idea is to engage the public not only with machine itself but to use the ball as a way to facilitate interaction with the spectators until they cease to be spectators and become a part of the show.

•   Fusion Festival (Larz, Germany)28 July - 3 August 2013

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  A crazy Hamsterrad fur die Fusion Festival! This is our first art installation for the Fusion Festival and we are really proud of it. Although we have never been to the festival before, we managed to dream up this ball, which is the result of endless talks on how to include everyone in the creation, through long arguments over the design and a general desire to push the limits of reality while maintaining our sanity. The project will incorporate the collective's love of construction and facilitate the strong culture of performance that we have. The Ball gave us the opportunity to create and discover together and we hope it can give to the public of the Fusion festival the opportunity to be amazed and entertained as it rolls through the festival grounds.

Mechalgorithmics

A mechanic algorithm that generate an abstract painting by means of a pedal-activated peristaltic pump and the danse of a mechanical creature. This algorithm enables users to interact with the scultpure in order to create unique artworks.

•   Kinetica Art Fair (London, UK)27 February - 3 March 2013

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  Our first exhibition at the Kinetica Art Fair in London (UK), as well as our first exhibition outside of Schengen area. Our Semiautomatic Painting Machine evolved quite a bit and was exhibited amongst about 100 other intruiging kinetic art pieces.

The O-Pen

The O-Pen is a open source software that clearly displays its mechanisms to the public, so that anyone can reproduce it at home, and hopefully improve it - provided that the derived work will itself be released under the same conditions.

•   La Machine du Moulin Rouge (Paris, France)2 February 2013

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  The O-Pen has also been selected by the French Burning Man committee to be exhibited as a kinetic and interactive installation during the French burning man celebration in Paris.
•   Centre Pompidou (Paris, France)31 January 2013

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  To celebrate Public Domain Day, we brought The O-Pen to the Centre Pompidou, as an illustration of an artwork based exclusively on Public Domain materials (old books, recuped metal and public domain technologies) which generates Public Domain works thanks to the interaction with the public.
•   La Gaite Lyrique (Paris, France)15 December 2012

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  To celebrate the 10th anniversary of Creative Commons, we have been invited to exhibit The O-Pen, a mechanical software that facilitate the production of collaborative art pieces by the public. The idea is to illustrate, mechanically, how an algorithm would look like if it were to be implemented in the real world.

Nuit Blanche - Murs a Peches
Montreuil (France)

6 October 2012

For the Nuit Blanche of Paris, we had the honnor of being invited by the Fer a Coudre to exhibit our work at the Murs a Peches in Montreuil. That's why our automatic artist got converted one more time, from a paint-spitter to a fire-spitter. The paint has been replaced by kerozene and a fire ball has been located on the tongue of our mechanical creature (now regarded as a dragon) so that it would start spitting fire as soon as the public activates the mechaninism through the pedals.

•   An elemental exploration

Cabaret Sauvage - Parc de la Villette
Paris (France)

7-29 July 2012

We remixed our automatic artist, to transform it into a "fashion designer" that decorates the clothes of the public who activate the beast in order to make it spit tinted paint. Whenever the public pedals fast enough, the beast also starts producing soap bubbles to entertain children in the park.

•   Mechalgorithmics

Centquatre
Paris (France)

16-17 June 2012

A mechanic algorithm that generate an abstract painting by means of a pedal-activated peristaltic pump and the danse of a mechanical creature. This algorithm enables users to interact with the scultpure in order to create unique artworks.

•   Mechalgorithmics

Hommage to my mother
Paris (France)

22 May 2012

To celebrate my mom's birthday, who lives in the USA, we wanted to create something big but nonetheless easily transportable. We decided to create a foldable lamp that opens and closes according to the atmosphere that ones wants to create.

•   Open your Heart

International Jazz Day - UNESCO
Paris (France)

30 April 2012

After having participated to the Music Hack Paris (a weekend event during which groups of creators gather to imagine, design and build innovative projects around music), we have been invited to show our creation at the UNESCO headquarter in Paris on Friday 27 12pm during the International Jazz Day.

•   Experimetal Music

Hommage to my father
Paris (France)

11 April 2012

To celebrate my dad's birthday, we decided to create a multifunctional object that can be used as either a plant, a fountain, a fan, a humidificator, and why not, some kind of home decoration.

•   Blowing OverFlow

Sans Plomb - (Collectif artistique)
Ivry-sur-Seine (France)

Janvier-Aout 2012

This is the place that better represents our world: an interesting integration of interesting artists combining aesthitics, functionality and mecanamorphosis. This places inspired us, and we decided to give to it the result of our own inspirations, mostly produced from recouped materiars. The idea was to enhance this place with a series of artworks piece that can be useful and functional from a variety of useless and/or unfonctional materials.

•   The Re-Cycling Fountain
•   The Butterfly Pump
•   The Flower of Shower
•   F13

Le Carosse - Les ateliers de Menilmontant
Paris (France)

23-25 September 2011

Every year, artists, sculptors, painters, video makers, etc. working in the Menilmontant area in Paris open up their studios to the public in order to display their creative process to the public. We have been invited to display our installation at the Carosse, temporarily turning the place into laguna for the sake of the art ..

•   The Cyclic Fountain
•   The Butterfly Pump
•   The Flower of Shower
•   The Bug-o-Meter
•   The Illusion of Liberty

Batofar
Paris (France)

September 2011

Serendipity was on its way when we received a random request for helping a stranger workin on an installation involving bikes and pumps. This is how we met Oliver Bishop-Young, a young artist involved in the business of skip conversion who asked us to collaborate on his project at the Batofar. Three living reedbeds (inside three converted skips) are installed along the banks of the Seine. The river water is pumped through by means of a peristaltic pump (a converted bike) and is then used to nourish the plants. All water that passes through the system will be purified. This purified water will then take one last trip through people powered water features before returning to the river just that little bit cleaner.

•   The cyclic Fountain

Nowhere - European Burning Man
Saragoza (Spain)

5-10 July 2011

A rejected proposal for Burning Man turned into a successful proposal for its European counterpart, Nowhere, the European Burning Man festival.
This is how we ended up creating the Synthetic Dichotomy: a pentagonal pyramid of canvas, steel and an apex of brightness, containing an oscillating display of light, shadow, music and philosophy. Inside pedals await people to bring this machine to life and with that life begins the dance of the shadow ballerina, together with the opportunity to explore our own darkness over a veil of light. The Synthetic Dichotomy is meant to create a world that can be entered, activated and hopefully understood. The installation brings people to a place where they can recognize and engage their own opposite, their shadow. It invites them to celebrate the paradox of light and darkness within all of us...

•   The Synthetic Dichotomy

Brac - Libreria Cafe'
Firenze (Italy)

March 2011 - today

An anamorphic projector projecting a rotating shadow-comic describing a fable about the artistic process as we see it thus far. The story is told via some donated plexiglass and and a combination of bike parts that we could never have thought of if we had tried desgining this before building it. It was the most difficult, time consuming, frustrating and lovely journey to date and it marks the beginning of our exploration into the world of metamechanics.

•   Mechanamorphosis

CPA - The Cinema
Firenze (Italy)

January 2011 - today

We are not very fan of cinema, but we are big fans of Gian Luca, the manager of the cinema at the CPA (Centro Popolare Autogestito) in Florence - an amazing place that faith had brought us to in order to become the managers of the Ciclofficina (the bike coop). Gian Luca once came to visit us, and as we realized that he actually loved our art, we decided to give him a present:

•   The Cinematographic Tree

Cuculia - Libreria Cafe'
Firenze (Italy)

November 2010 - today

After strange feelings of abandoment and a real sense of being under appreciated, a wonderful man and a beautiful place came to the rescue of our oversized creations. We spent some extra time setting them to the setting and they settled right in like it was their home.

[SECTION UNDER CONSTRUCTION]

•   In the Cuculia Nest
•   Lounge Set
•   The Tree

Festival della Creativita
Firenze (Italy)

21-24 October 2010

As we first arrived to Florence, we did not have many expectations about its artistic scene. We knew that Florence is extremely reknown for old and beautiful renaissance art, and for that reason, we did not think there was any room left for modern or contemporary art in this city. Florence immediately proved us wrong. As time passed by, we started to explore the city and discovered to our own surprise that there is indeed still a lot of room for new and contemporary art. As we first went to the Festival della Creativita - a 4 days long festival that is entirely oriented towards creativity, expressivity, and innovation - we realized that Florence is in fact an amazing city when it comes to art. It was therefore with great pleasure that we accepted the invitation to participate to the 2010 edition of the Festival together with the crew of La Citta' Riciclante, an amazing group of people whose raw material is scrap and junk. This is where we belong.

•   La Citta' Riciclante
•   Lounge Set
•   The Trees

Italian Burning Man
Alviano (Italy)

8-10 October 2010

You look out and you see a silhouette of a very sexy dancer shadowed along the wall. You walk up and step up next to her and you can now see your own shadow now cast right next to you. You also notice that as you got closer to her, the shadow has begun to dance. Yet, the only you thing you see is a strangely decorated wheel spinning around and some real funky shadow dance moves taking place right in front of you... so of course, you start dancing too... How is that going to happen? Well, we have devised a plan that involves some old mechanic and technological devices, and, of course, a lot of programming and experimentation with anamorphic images generation.

•   The Shadow Revolution

Free Ginger Zone
Scandicci. FI (Italy)

September-October 2010

Although originally conceived for La Cite, the idea was that our tree would travel around Florence in order to see and be seen by a variety of people from different places and backgrounds. As opposed to a real tree, which is stuck to the ground and can only enter in contact with the people that come towards it, we wanted our tree to be a vagabond, a gipsy with no real home, that just travels from one place to another, in order to move again, whenever and wherever people would welcome it. A tree may not be really easy to move, but with enough courage and tenacity, we can move pretty much anything. After La Cite' left the Limonaia of Palazzo Strozzi to move back into its winter location, the tree has therefore been brought to the Ginger Zone in Scandicci, where it has been exhibited for a few months.

•   La Cite' Illuminaire

La Cite - Libreria Cafe'
Limonaia del Palazzo Strozzi. Firenze (Italy)

July-August 2010

We, Okhaos, make things to grow our world, to expand our understanding and perception of what's possible and we hope that others can share in that wonder with us. This particular tree brought many of our convictions about art/li fe to fruition. A tree is the symbol of growth in many cultures, and it's interesting that it would be, considering that it must be one of the slowest growing things on earth and unless intermittently watched for a long period of time, it gives no evidence of Growth. But it does grow and it seems that it grows in a way that captures our admiration and also in a way that is constantly beautiful and continually getting better (beauty at every step). It's the continually improving part, we think that makes a tree so popular, most of us ani mals tend to worsen with age and we long for the kind of growth that a tree experiences. Tree Growth, as a process, has been described in mathematics as a fractal, a chaotic and often beautiful pattern (sinusodality). We didn't think of beautiful and chaotic equations wh ile making this tree but we did try and embrace both chaos and beauty during the time that we spent growing this tree. As for ourselves, we've grown too, we now know, more than ever that when the process of making something is wonderful then it follows that the resulting product (assuming it survives) will grow into something equally as fantastic...

•   La Cite' Illuminaire

Sottopassaggio delle Cure
Firenze (Italy)

June 2010

Right next to our house is this tunnel, an underground tunnel that allows people from florence to cross the terribly designed railroad system that divide the city into two distinct and non-interroperable parts. In this tunnel lives Toto', b etter known as l'Angelo del Sottopassaggio, a bum with a strong inclination to making the world a better place. Toto' undertook the difficult task of turning this creepy and scary underground tunnel into an undeground art gallery, mainly populated by graffiti and tags, but n ot only. A gallery turned into an art gallery may sound cheesy, but it is actually surprising how art can actually make things change. The sottopassaggio delle Cure is nowadays a perfect destination for a pleasant promenade in the non-touristic parts of Firenze. Every day we would walk by, we knew we would be surprised by a new and interesting piece of graffiti art. So we decided to contribute.. with something completely different.

•   Sottopassaggio delle Cure

Bar Fiasco - European University Institute
San Domenico di Fiesole. FI (Italy)

June-December 2010

The idea came to us one evening in febuary aftter spending the entire day on unversity grounds. We went downstairs to meet some friends for a drink in the newly redecorated Fiasco Bar. After a few drinks the topic switched to the decoration of the place. We found it amazing and a little sad that a bar decorated in such a way could be called the Fiasco. It was as if we hadn't left university grounds in the sense that it still felt like we were in an "institution". In fact the campus of the EUI is quite beautiful and extremely interesting compared to the state of the Fiasco. It had freshly painted walls, with marron up to the chest and cream to the top of the wall and all over the ceiling. The only pictures on the walls were from ikea or some sort of beer propaganda. It was appalling to think that this where students and staff were supposed to relax and find relief from the "institutional" part of their life. So we began to discuss what we could do.
As our first major project in Florence, we wanted to make sure we did it right. So... we submitted a proposal to the bar explaining what we wanted to do. Our intention was to create a large piece of interactive art for each of the 4 departments at the EUI. We wanted to embrace the fact that the bar was on university grounds but simultaneously make it funky in order to enhance the atmosphere of the place. We were met with general excitement but a good amount of resitance to boot but in the end they let us go ahead.
Here's what we did:

•   Department of Law
•   Department of Economics
•   Department of History and Civilization
•   Department of Social and Political Sciences
•   Chair of Anarchy
•   Chair of Communism
•   Chair of Capitalism
•   Chair of Democracy
•   Table of Infinity