The ARCH


Nicolas Schoffer Gallery Opening
September 13, 2008, 3:49 pm
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Nicolas Schoffer Gallery Opening in Second Life, Saturday, September 13, 2008. More info HERE.  Slurl HERE.

“Like most pioneers, when the young 24 year old Hungarian painter Nicolas Schöffer went to Paris in 1936, it’s not likely that he could have imagined he was embarking on a journey to become one of the most important artists of the twentieth century.

Known today as the Father of Cybernetic Art, Schöffer’s career spanned more than 5 decades and explored painting, kinetic sculpture, architecture, urbanism, town planning, music, theater, film and video; his research and theory produced 11 books, ten of which were published.

Schöffer’s  lifelong pursuit of Dynamism in his works was influenced by the philosophies of the Constructionist Movement that developed in the early part of the twentieth century, and further inspired by the works of Norbert Wiener. Schöffer believed that art must utilize the technology and materials of the time and he applied Wiener’s theories on cybernetics to illustrate a level of interactivity within his creations that the world had never before seen.

In 1985, Schöffer lost the use of his right hand, as a result of a stroke, but his work continued as he explored new research in Graphic Poetry “Choreographics” was an example of this and explored the feelings of surface with his left hand. and in 1988 “Ordigraphics “ new research with his left hand on the Macintosh computer on which colour has been added by hand, and the Ordicols (collages including small computer graphic pieces) are considered priceless drawings.

The inaugural launch of the Second Life Gallery is being held in conjunction with an real life exposition of  30 of these computer graphics and collages called ORDIGRAPHIC, COLLEOGRAPHIC and ORDICOL which are being presented for the first time at the the Gyula Nagy Gallery in Lovas, Hungary.”

Additionally, a limited number of copies of Schöffer’s last book referring to this period “SURFACE ET ESPACE” will be available for purchase. Contact Lucinda Bergbahn for details.

Depo Consulting is proud to host the opening of the Nicolas Schöffer Gallery in the Virtual World of Second Life on Saturday, September 13, 2008 from 1-3PM PST.

Bennet Dynamo, creative director of Depo Consulting, has once again created a gallery in virtual space that is itself a work of art that we are sure you will enjoy.

The gallery continues the evolution of Bennet’s RL and SL exploration of folded form, three distinct undulating linear wands are captured for one moment of their movement across the water at a lobby frame born from Schoffer’s island.  A animated boat tour is also available which will shuttle gallery visitors between the Nicolas Schöffer Gallery and the Lucien Hervé Gallery that was opened in the Depo Business Park in July 2008.

Please join us for this exciting event. Entertainment will be provided from 2-3pm PST by the rock band Friendly Fire.



UNIT 13

This video is now officially my favorite Second Life machinima of all time (not just because they mention Wikitecture 😉  Their use of hybrid machinima is incredibly well done, and the way they portray the architectural possibilities of virtual space is very inspiring; emphasizing a kind of virtual architecture not exclusively tethered to physical replication, yet navigationally familiar enough to prevent disorientation.

UNIT 13 is an informal unit of the Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL. It was organized to explore the capabilities of virtual worlds for architectural practice. Unit 13 is currently operated within Second Life.”

Outstanding work, Unit 13!  We can’t wait to see what you guys do next!

Thanks to Dusan Writer for the heads up!



Be2Camp: Exploring Web 2.0 in the built environment

Interest in the upcoming Be2Camp on October 10th is growing rapidly, and I would highly recommend joining the community HERE to be informed of future updates on the agenda as it emerges.  Even if you can’t make it to London, we are hoping to stream some of the content into Second Life live.  I will post updates as new information about that becomes available, but for now, here are a few quotes just to set the stage for what is sure to be a very exciting event:

From the Public Works Group Blog: “How can the building industry use Web 2.0 tools to enhance delivery of services and better integrate new concepts like sustainability? These are some of the questions and issues that will be discussed at the upcoming barcamp, Be2Camp

From the be2camp site: “The concept for be2camp started as a Twitter conversation between Martin Brown and Paul Wilkinson, following Martin’s attendance at barcamp type events, suggesting we do ‘something’ for the (UK) built environment. This discussion was picked by Jodie Miners in Australia, again through Twitter, and through conversations within Second Life with Pam Broviak from Illinois, USA. The timing of the event has been fixed to coincide with Jodie’s visit to the UK. We do hope Pam will be able to attend, if not she will be coordinating the be2camp Second Life activities. So now you know who to contact, praise or blame!”