Future Urban Networks: Joris Laarman Lab: Bits and Crafts

May 1 - June 14, 2014

Friedman Benda, New York, NY

The exhibition comprises four thematic explorations; Maker furniture; Micro Structures; Vortex; and Spirographic—each the culmination of massive research, cutting-edge fabrication, handcraft, and personal aesthetic.

Aside from creating significant experimental designs, similar to the modernists who made manuals of their designs, Laarman’s lab plans to publish digital blueprints on the Internet accessible to all. Not compromising freedom of form and personalization, the blueprints are open for people to change, modify and creating themselves, thereby offering an entirely new paradigm for manufacturing and distribution. The Maker puzzle chair is the world’s first crowd fabricated prototype, also available for home printing.

MAKER: Born out of disagreement with the limited bounding box and poor material choice of many today’s digital fabrication methods, Maker pieces are built from many parametric parts engineered to fit exactly like a 3 dimensional puzzle. Multiple materials (resin, solid woods, plastics, metals) and differentiated shapes (triangular, hexagonal, figurative, pixilated) respond to strength and aesthetic necessities, while the multiplicity of small elements enable greater freedom and complexity of shape. For example, the efficient use of high quality materials like solid wood in surprising organic shapes.

VORTEX: Using digital algorithms, new and unexpected forms emerge that balance functionality and ornament – a theme that exists in many of Laarman’s works, each behaving in some way symbiotically. The generative design tool and manufacturing method of the aluminum Vortex Bookshelf and Console allows the production of unique designs.

SPIROGRAPHIC SERIES: Pieces manufactured using the MX3D printer (MX3D-metal), a robotic 3D printer created by Joris Laarman Lab. With the 12 x 8-foot Dragon bench, small amounts of molten stainless steel are printed mid-air, enabling Laarman to draw lines in space, at times complexly intersecting. The printed shapes are based on algorithms and non- repetitive parametric modules so the generated forms are unique. For an advance preview on MX3D: www.jorislaarman.com/mx3d-metal.html

MIRCRO STRUCTURES: Representing Laarman’s delve into the deeper facets of 3D printing furniture, this group of work, including the Gradient Chair, is engineered on a cellular level. Elaborating on a long history of polyurethane use in furniture design, the Gradient chair is made of 3D printed thermoplastic polyurethane modulated at its structural points to be solid, and at the open parts, to be flexible and soft like foam that is engineered on a cellular level.