VERY cool. Perhaps somewhat less cool: it’s apparently viral marketing for that movie Chronicle. “Look, up in the sky! It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s… product placement!” But still. Wow.

[Via Wayne Chambliss / Gizmodo]

Post tags: Advertising, Memes, Surreal, Technology, Testing your faith, Uncanny Valley

“Tim Lewis combines mechanical devices and sculpture to investigate, test and experiment with his own doubts and perception of the world.” (via)

Lewis, recently interviewed about his work by Dazed Digital, makes a compelling statement about the power inherent in tangibility:

I think that when you first approach a piece of art, and you imagine it and draw it, there’s a sense that it will always remain somewhat in your imagination. Its only when you take the 2D object and re-work it into the physical 3D world that it becomes somewhat more real. It no longer just exists in your eyes and mind, but instead has to react with the floors and walls around it in the physical world. For me, kinetic art highlights the importance of bringing both inventions and imagination into a physical existence.

Lewis’ work is regularly exhibited and promoted by the folks who run the Kinetica Museum and related events in Spitalfields, London. Their annual Kinetica Art Fair is coming up in February. As it has for the past several years, the Fair will bring together “galleries, art organisations and curatorial groups from around the world who focus on universal concepts and evolutionary processes though the convergence of kinetic, electronic, robotic, sound, light, time-based and multi-disciplinary new media art, science and technology.”

Are any of our UK readers going? Please do report back! It sounds amazing.

Via Tertiary, thanks!

Post tags: Art, Britannia, Events, Industrial, Museum, Robots, Sculpture, Surreal, Technology, Uncanny Valley

Who among our readers remembers The Rock-afire Explosion animatronic stage show from their pepperoni ‘n’ cheese-drenched childhood? It was the brainchild of one Mr. Aaron Fechter, who, in addition to creating and heading a company called Creative Engineering Incorporated, invented the Whac-a-Mole, and co-founded a venture called Showbiz Pizza Place in 1979, which eventually merged with –and became more commonly known as– Chuck E. Cheese (apparently under bitter circumstances).

In spite of a handful of painful business disappointments over the past thirty years, Fechter and his team have stayed the course, and C.E. Inc. remains “a leader in the Family Entertainment business”, designing and manufacturing “sophisticated animatronic stage shows for many amusement parks and entertainment centers around the world”.

Fechter’s company has additionally been involved in several somewhat less HappyHappyFuntimez™ projects of various sizes and technologies, ranging from development of robotic soldiers for the U.S. Army (“a great success, I might add”, says Fechter) to water removal systems for commericial roofing (“not one of my best”).

But through it all, Fechter’s heart has remained devoted to “developing high-tech equipment to entertain and amuse the public while developing the self-esteem of the participants”.

Read the rest of BTC: The Rock-afire Explosion

Post tags: Animation, Better than coffee, Gaming, Music, Puppetry, Robots, Silly-looking types, Technology, Testing your faith, Uncanny Valley

Via John Coulthart!

“boy·taur \’boi-tawr\ n 1 : a guy with four (or more) legs 2 : a guy with any of a variety of multilimb or other transformations 3 : a guy who enjoys the company of boytaurs, and is thus a boytaur in spirit”

“There’s something wildly, almost primally, attractive about a guy with four legs: the crowding of long, sculpted thigh muscle, the four calf muscles bobbing and working in rhythm with his four-legged walk, the four strong male feet supporting his powerful boytaur body. Boytaurs know this attraction well, and it is our constant joy, both to have and to share.”

“Of course, many boytaurs don’t stop with four legs. Some add more legs, going six-legged or more. Some add extra arms. And many, enjoying all their boytaur feet, decide to go wristfooted as well.”

“Other boytaurs have completely different transformations, or none at all, but are still boytaurs in spirit, enjoying their augmented bodies, and sharing that joy freely. boytaur.net is dedicated to helping that sharing go on across the internet, all around the world.”

Post tags: Fairy Tales, Fetish, Queer, Serious Business, Silly-looking types, Uncanny Valley, Why

“We are presenting for sale a limited edition bronze sculpture of a centaur couple in love’s embrace. The sculpture is entitled UNBRIDLED LOVE. The statue is cast in bronze by the traditional lost wax method. Each sculpture is individually patinaed and will therefore appear slightly different from any other. The sculpture is newly cast upon order. Delivery time for this statue is three months. Each statue is hand detailed, numbered in a limited edition of 50, and signed by the artist. All image and production rights are retained by the artist. $4850″

Post tags: Flora & Fauna, Magic, Sculpture, Sexuality, Silly-looking types, Stroke Material, Uncanny Valley

“Cupid and Centaur” by Joel-Peter Witkin (1992)

(Preaching to the choir, here, but) Is there another photographer living whose sublime darkroom necromancy conveys quite the same level of beauty, horror, ferocity, compassion, grace and grotesquerie as Witkin’s? Doubtful.

Buy his books:

• Witkin
• The Bone House
• Joel-Peter Witkin (Phaedon 55s)
• Harms Way: Lust & Madness, Murder & Mayhem
• Disciple & Master

Post tags: Art, Fairy Tales, Flora & Fauna, Medical, Memento Mori, Photography, Uber, Uncanny Valley

Via Douglas, with thanks. And a vague, yet all-pervading sense of awe.

How delightful to realize, no! Apparently, there’s just some redolently centauromachian vapor riding the air currents right now.

Folks, it’s officially CENTAUR WEEK on Coilhouse.

Consider yourselves warned.

Post tags: Animation, Crackpot Visionary, Fairy Tales, Fetish, Geekdom, Sexuality, Silly-looking types, Stroke Material, Testing your faith, Uber, Uncanny Valley, Why

Fashion retailer H&M recently got called out for using computer-generated bodies in their online catalogue.

The company has admitted that the bodies are “completely virtual,” with faces of real models pasted in. “This is a technique that is not new, it is available within the industry today,” said an H&M spokesperson. “The virtual mannequins are used in the same way as we use mannequins in our stores for ladies wear and menswear.”

Bloggers and media awareness groups have responded with appropriate criticism. Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation spokesman Helle Vaagland said, “this illustrates very well the sky-high aesthetic demands placed on the female body.” Blogger T.M. Gaouette writes, “I’m confused! If the intention is to just show the items of clothing, then why put real heads on fake bodies? Why not just put a fake head on the fake body? Is the real head needed so that we can relate to the models as human beings? But how is that possible when we are faced with a perfect body to which no one can relate?”

On Facebook, a couple of friends expressed concern that this trend will decrease the number of jobs available to working models. Another issue is the creepiness factor: “Man,” writes Jenna Sauer at Jezebel, “isn’t looking at the four identical bodies with different heads so uncanny?”

With that in mind, there are a few beautiful and amazing things going on here. First of all, there’s the unintentional modern art: this catalogue has brought us the haunting, Ringu-esque Model Without a Face. Also, this foray into the uncanny valley brings us one step closer to the age of the idoru. With teenage pop idol Aimi Eguchi, whose face is a composite of six different singers, and vocaloids (singing synthesizers) such as pigtailed holographic superstar Hatsune Miku, we’re almost there – in The Future. And even though H&M’s online catalogue conforms to the same beauty standard as any other big fashion retailer, this technology actually has the potential to subvert the paradigm altogether.

Imagine an online shop where your preferred weight/height/measurements are used to generate 3D models of the bodies that you want to see. Imagine if there was an API for this that could be used across all online clothing stores you visit, so that no matter what site you were looking at, the models appeared the way that you wanted them to. Standardized beauty ideals would become less relevant, because people would have greater control over their exposure to them.

In the short term, it may seem like computer-generated models reinforce a homogenous beauty standard. In the long term, this technology may pave the way towards greater body diversity and inclusiveness.

Post tags: Fashion, Future, Opinion, Technology, Uncanny Valley

Via Devon, thanks!

This beautiful video footage was recently shot by the Asia Society Museum in New York City, where Korean artist U-Ram Choe‘s most recent triumph, a shimmering, golden, “breathing” sculpture, is being premiered.

Most of Choe’s elaborate kinetic sculptures are assembled from stainless steel and acrylic, and motorized with robotics that he himself develops and programs. The above work, called Custos Cavum (“Guardian of the Hole” in Latin) is a particularly delicate and elaborate piece created as a response to this tenth-century Shiva Nataraja sculpture. (Custos Cavum is part of the Asia Society’s “In Focus” series, which invites contemporary artists to craft new works inspired by pieces from the museum’s permanent collection. Choe’s new work is being shown with the Shiva sculpture.)

Choe has stated that his creation is “a creature [that] protects the flow of communication between the two realms that assures mutual respect. In this fable, the guardian is a symbol of coexistence just as the Hindu god, Shiva, is a symbol of balance and harmony.” (via)

The exhibition will run until December 31, 2011.

Previously on Coilhouse:

• Theo Jansen’s Stunning Strandbeests
• Ron Pippin’s Biomechanical Menagerie
• John Nolan’s Animatronics
• A playlist of vintage automatons

Post tags: Art, Flora & Fauna, Museum, Robots, Sculpture, Technology, Uncanny Valley

In the alien world of Raymond Lemstra everyone wears masks, and yet, no one does. Here we have strange artifacts, the masks of some long forgotten Martian tribe or, perhaps, another dimension altogether. They have life to them, though, these bizarre visages, as if they were not fashioned from wood but were, instead, impressions of actual faces, like death masks. Indeed, his figures reinforce this feeling, their faces cuboid and frozen. One gets the feeling that the people underneath this ornamental headgear aren’t obscuring their features or hiding their identities, but merely accentuating them.

Via we make money not art

Read the rest of Raymond Lemstra’s Masked World

Post tags: Art, Surreal, Uncanny Valley