Documentation of projects from the class Space is the Place by Max Neupert in the winter semester 2009/2010:
Hamish John Appleby: DREAMS IN INNER SPACE AND THE FRONTIER OF THE VOID
DREAMS IN SPACE, BLINDFOLDED AND BOUNDLESS - A workshop by: Hamish John Appleby
THE PROCESS '“The visions we offer our children shape the future. It matters what those visions are. Often they become self-fulfilling prophecies. Dreams are maps” Carl Sagan, 1994.'
WHERE AND WHAT I am currently running a creative workshop with the students from the Waldorf Schüle in Weimar – So far this has been a fantastic opportunity for both myself and the students(I hope) to engage in a workshop or kind of ‘mini project’ that they have probably never encountered before, with the outcome being a possible mini exhibition of drawings – or other creations.
A GREAT QUOTE “I shut my eyes in order to see”. --Paul Gauguin
LOCATION: Waldorfschule Weimar
Andreas Beyer: The Radiostar
Since more than 100 years humankind uses technology for broardcasting content and for some physics reasons nearly 80% of that signals are just "lost" in space. That means the nearby outer space ( 100 ly orbit) is in a way a kind of radioarchive or a cultural documentation of hunmankinds ability to send signals with several technologies. I'm focused on the frequency band of ultra short wave radio signals. To explain this cosmic-international radioarchive, I want to create a navigationplan to "travel" through that archive. the installation will be a (selfmade) telescopebody (no tech inside) that can be moved in different directions to zoom into a model of that "radiohalo". The room, where the telescope will be placed, is prepaired with some small radiotransmitters (selfmade) to symbolize where some particularly broadcasts are “waving” in outer space. Inside that telescopebody will be some, i think maybe three, radioreceivers to get in contact with the transmitters and by moving that telescopebody the recipient can adjust the programm that sounds in the body of the telescope (sorry for my bad english).
Kyd Campbell: in the direction of the frontier
keywords: space, frontier, dreams, dispersion, forward, ahead, distance, pathway, vibration, waves, western, cowboy, horse, self, psychedelia, utopia, horizon, beyond
Moving forwards towards towards a frontier.
The goal of this project is to produce a machine for self video recording and capturing alternate states of movement.
The image will include a subject moving into the distance. In the image, a large rope, visibly attached to the camera point will lead towards the subject, as it is pulling the camera, filming itself.
I constructed a specialized camera mount for holding and stabilising the camera on a rope. The subject is instructed to pull on the rope. Currently, the rope is tied to a fixed point.
Fan Yu: Reisen duch Zeit und Raum
"Ich schlafe in Praha , arbeite in Berlin, esse in Beijing, spiele in Paris.... Welt ist nicht so groß. Ich kann irgendwohin gehe, ob es auf dem Mond ist.” Es ist ein Traum von mir... Aber es kann sein...''
Haben Dinosaurier Haar? Warum ist die Maya-Kultur verschwunden? Wer tötete John F. Kennedy? Was ist der öffentlichen verkehr? Sind Zeitreisen und Raumreisen möglich? Oder nur ein Menschheitstraum? Ob können die Fakten direkt vor unseren Augen sein?...” So vielen Fragen sind in meinem Kopf… vielecht stehen die Lösung schon langer Zeit im Internet!!
Ich hoffe, dass Sie mit meine Arbeit irgendwohin gehen können. Nach ein Sekunde Lang sind die Fakten direkt vor Augen... “
Jamie Ferguson: Vanessa_Cardui in Space
This project began by following the 'Butterflies In Space' project sponsored by the National Space Biomedical Research Institute; Vanessa Cardui larvae that hatched six days earlier flew aboard Space Shuttle Atlantis to the International Space Station. Children from American elementary schools were encouraged to take part by creating their own butterfly habitats in the class room, to watch the butterflies live and grow and die over the course of 25 days; the greatest variable being gravity. The second was possibly the 'payload', the artificial habitat taken aboard to house the larvae. The difference is not so much in its content but with the container itself. A 'flight certified scientific insert' was developed at BioServe Space Technologies at the University of Colorado. "Our…competency is enabling the conduct of space life sciences research in a highly regulated environment in such a way as to make the complicated process completely transparent to the investigator." This appeared a very different object from the terrariums and disposable plastic food containers the school children were promoted to use, but their aims were comparable.
André Wünscher, Anica Huck, Hannes Wagner, Michael Schlund, Michaela Honauer, Thomas Fritzsche: Voyageo
VOYAGEO consists of projections of satellite pictures onto the human body. These pictures are not about act photography, but about the recognition of earth and the human body. Mankind has a high selfconfidence about itself and its reign on earth but still is not really selfaware. We are trying to produce thus selfconsciousness by showing not the beauty showed in today's media. We want to have a look on the everyday reality of body and earth.
Henrike Schneider: Waste Circulation (Erfurt-Schwerborn)
Since the evolution of mankind humans have struggled to grasp the idea of infinity. Leading academics including philosophers, mathematicians, scientists and artists continue to make efforts in a bid to better comprehend infinity as a concept. A particular emphasis has been directed towards debates focusing on explanations regarding the universe and its expansion.
Infinity is the topic of art works and theoretical essays. During the Romantic – Caspar David Friedrich tried to visualize the feeling of infinity in his drawings. Superiority.
The moebius strip is a visual explanation of infinity and today used as a symbol in our daily life. The moebius strip presents a circuit and also the idea of repetition, with no beginning and no end.
As evident in the picture, including planet Earth, numerous circuits exists exist within our Solar System. The Earth is rotating around the Sun, the Moon around the Earth. A sunset and a sunrise represents the start and end of a 24 hour day. We have 365 days a year, 12 months and four seasons. Those cycles are always present. Additionally such order takes various other forms. Blood, water, economic and recycling circulation is also presented through a moebius strip.
Waste remains an unsolved problem. Circulation is possible, but also goes along with environmental problems. In my work - I am focusing on the the current problem of disposal sites in Germany and its use. Focusing on the topic 'Space is the place', I endeavor to direct much attention towards the Erfurt-Schwerborn disposal site. Since 2005 significant have occurred. Furthermore several other disposal sites in Germany have been shut down due environmental related issues. No longer can one find unhandled rubbish on the landfills.
Circa 6ha of 18ha of the disposal site are renatured by now. Animals and vegetation are creating a natural environment out of a former „dead“ place. In the future there will be a natural park in conjunction with a new recycling center. As this indicates, the area Erfurt-Schwerborn is transforming dramatically.
I aim to both conceptualize and visualize the idea of circulation; the before and after - the idea of infinity. In order to do so I will use the stylistic devices of Caspar David Friedrich and the still changing area of Erfurt-Schwerborn. The protagonist of my work will be a garbage man who plays an important role regarding waste circulation, serving to be the connecting link between the old and the new.
Next to the picture I will put interview pieces. Questions, which are dealing with the problems of waste and its circulation.
Martin Ketelhut/Sylvia Rohr: Alieno - Artificial space pictures made by pure photography and montage
The plan was to produce artificial space pictures that are made by pure photography and montage. Different materials, objects, gases and liquid mixtures - directly shot or shot through a microscope with short and long exposure time - built the basis and got later arranged to those space pics.
During the work hundrets of hubble pics and images in books (e.g. Mackowiak, Bernhard. Planeten, Sterne, Universum. Naumann & Göebel Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, Köln) inspired us. It is impressive how totally different the look of those images can be (real-looking, like drawn, false colored etc.)
Bianka Langnickel: Bookproject: “space is my place” – aren‘t we all aliens?
for me space is in general is a very undefined place. as i think it encourage everybody to use their whole imagination and creativity i will use this unknown area to create my own place, figures and spacy environments. i am going to make an illustrated book for children which consists of these imaginary protagonists and will lead them to an abstract way of creating their own playground. the book will give them the opportunity to reconstruct the creatures by themselfs and learn how to create their own „aliens“. when the child is interacting with the object playing a part in the story its more easy for them to get a connection between the actual sense of making up something in addition to the creative process. they can use the „aliens“ they build before to make up further stories and play them within their family. so in the end their will be a book which provides a inter-social way of reading, listening, building and a wide range of playing effects on little children as much as on adults. it is „talking“ to different senses and invites everybody to join who loves to see the world and especially the space more open minded and in a creatively way of thinking about „outhere“.
- Stage
- making experiments with the materials related to space and the figures to construct out of this material
- finding an ideal story
- Stage
- creating all of the figures
- build sets where the figures act in
- Stage
- testing photographie equipment and lighting, composition etc.
- final photographie work - taking pictures of the actual sets
- Stage
- postproduction _ retusche - like making the pictures more detailed, contrasted and fix some shadow areas etc.
- Stage
- illustrate the be-creative part
- Stage
- search for a publisher
calculated time for all parts: 1 year
Stefan Bernhardt and Christoph Schreiber: Captain Rock'it and the Sound of Stars
Imagine the universe's infinite emptiness, a place where absolute silence rules. We want to fill this space symbolical and to give the innumerably stars a special sound. In interaction between the user with the stars and the stars among themselves, there will be different sounds create. They will picture a musically portrait of the universe.
Katarina Sengstaken, Timea Tofalvi, Yuxiang Wen, and Shuo Liu: A Faraway Cold Palace (广寒宫)
The moon has come into focus again in the great Space race. It has been forty years since Neil Armstrong landed on the moon, now after the recent discovery of water on the moon a new interest has been sparked about finally heading back. In this new moon race has new contenders, the US and Russia are no longer in the lead. By 2015 it might be a Chinese man to be the next to step foot on the moon.
We conceptualize our project around dissolving the western ideals and myths about the moon and working with Chinese mythology and symbolism as our focus. Our concept of the moon stems from the three Chinese moon myths the story of Chang'e 嫦娥, Wu Gang吴刚 , and the Jade Rabbit 玉兔. These three myths revolve around a mystical laurel tree that grows on the moon.
Jan Frederik Vogt: OUR STARS
We took the stars from the sky. They are used by us. You can find them in logos, distinctions, decorations, jewellery, names, pictures and many other uses. Have a look at our own starry sky.
Find out more about the project.
Luo Yu: Virtual Solar System (3D Online-Platform)
Virtual Solar System is an innovative 3D online platform. Through this you will not only learn the structure and context of the solar system, but also a fantastic space that can be experienced through simple interactive body movements. When the user visited this platform, the hand movements of user will recorded by the camera as commands. Once the system has found a projector connection, this platform is switched into the "astronaut mode", in this mode you can move in front of the screen free by own hands and feet in order to feel the spectacular of the spacewalk. Each user can even set up their own celestial bodies and share online.