Fahrzeuge Inszenierung

This amazing kinetic sculpture was made by Art+Com for the BMW Museum. More than 700 metal balls hanging on wires are controlled by a computer to generate surfaces... in this case classic BMW cars. (via)

The original 1973 building was designed by the Viennese architect Karl Schwanzer and nicknamed “the bowl”. It has been expanded to five times its original size. Media installations literally set the museum’s seven themed buildings, 25 exhibition rooms and 125 exhibits in motion. Highlights include the “Mediatecture”, a 700-square-metre glass facade used as a media screen around “BMW Square” and the “Kinetic Sculpture” in the House of Design. The mechatronic installation, made up of 714 metal balls, is a spatial translation of a design process. Seemingly weightless and guided solely by the power of the mind, the sculpture moves through a cycle of free abstractions and typical BMW vehicle forms.

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Innovar 2008

One of the winners of this year's innovation awards (Concurso Innovar 2008) in the category Industrial Design are the assistive technology devices by Alt: altPulse, altBoard and altMouse. for kids and adults. Mercedes Ceciaga from ZUM disegno and a team who developed the products were recognized for developing this computer peripheral devices to allow easy access to a computer for people with disabilities. Big sized buttons, clear and simple configuration and interface, were the key issues considered for the award.

Special Kiwis is proud to be a distributor of Alt products in Canada, Mexico and New Zealand. On behalf of the Special Kiwis team, I send my congratulations to the designers and people behind Alt Products.

Felicidades!

Woven Together

Our friend Dzeni has been selected as one of three Auckland finalists for the "Yellow Pages Group" Art Awards. The winner for the Auckland region, who will have their art displayed on the next Auckland White pages® phone book, will be decided by online public voting. The finalists have been asked to support one of three charities - and Jenni is supporting Project K. If she wins, Project K will benefit by $10,000. Public voting is now open and we're asking for your vote! So please click here or go to ypgartawards.co.nz and vote for Jenni.

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4D travel

A terrible way to find yourself at the 4th dimension... "hallucii" a funny short film by Goo Shun Wang.

Don't drink and dream, or you might find yourself on an Escher nightmare.

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Swedish Style

And the winner of this year's Electrolux's design lab was the "flatshare" fridge. A clever idea to have separate compartments for those flatmates who always take your last slice of bread or your precious red-beer... that's much better than the big-brother approach which would be to install a tiny webcam inside the fridge. That way you could search the security video and tell your mate: "I saw you taking my cheese!".

- Flatshare fridge, with separate, portable modules powered by a single base station has won first prize in the Electrolux Design Lab 2008 competition. Conceived by Stefan Buchberger of the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, Flatshare also won the media award and the people’s choice award. “I got the idea to create the Flatshare fridge because in many shared flats there is a problem with the refrigerator, says Buchberger. “It gets filthy because no one person feels responsible for cleaning it.” College students, grad students and young professionals, for examlple, often share living spaces…and kitchens. With Flatshare, never again will they have to endure another person’s moldy cheese or old leftovers. -

From October 18 to 25, 2008, Swedish Style New Zealand will take place in Auckland as an initiative of the Embassy of Sweden to showcase contemporary Sweden in the fields of design, art, music, gastronomy, travel and sustainability. Design: The Value Connection, a three hour symposium will look at how New Zealand companies can translate Sweden’s acclaimed ability to add value through design. The symposium presenters are experienced and inspiring designers including Anders Breitholtz, industrial designer and entrepreneur; Bjorn Rietz, design advertising “guru” and entrepreneur; and Brian Richards, Brand Strategist, BRR. The session will be moderated by commentator and financial journalist Rod Oram. (via)

Date: Monday 20 October 2008
Time: 12.30pm to 4pm
Venue: AUT University, Conference Centre, Wellesley Street
Tickets: Free of charge.
Registration: Go to the Swedish style page or click here.

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400

WOW! 400 posts... and all those despite being sometimes a bit lazy to blog. Au contraire, Kaylee McKenzie is a very busy OZ girl. At just 16, she's finishing fashion design at one of Australia's top schools... but that's not the surprising part of the story. Kaylee has to deal with 3 disabilities: Cystic fibrosis, diabetes, and Asperger's syndrome. Watch the full story from disabilitytv.com. That's a designer with attitude!

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escorpeniformes

Today, I have some music to share. First, Madredeus - O Sonho, Fabulous song! I just don't understand why "the sea" on the live performance video seems to be "waterboarding" that girl. Is that supposed to be understood as their version of "Alfonsina y el mar" ? (yet another great song btw) That's my problem with Esther Píscore: I just don't get it. I'm not used to decipher meaning in dance just like I am used to analyse visual arts, maybe that's why it is so difficult for me to distinguish when a dance is implying something and when is "just because".

Another great album, not as fun as BPA's "Toe Jam" but worth listening, is Brian Eno and David Byrne's Everything that happens will happen today. Speaking of Byrne, his score for Big Love is great, but my favourite song of the show must be the intro by the Beach Boys.

And finally, something I should write on my christmas list (if it's ready by then): el diluvio by Jaramar Soto. That title sounds like a prophecy about the recent floodings in Veracruz and Tabasco.

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Herne Bay Petanque Fund Raiser

One again we've been invited by David Ciano to participate in the petanque tournament fund raiser for the Auckland Down Syndrome Association. Last year we donated a couple of mezcal bottles (including the traditional worm inside). This time Special Kiwis will be giving a couple of mp3 shuffle players for the raffle.

HERNE BAY PETANQUE WINE DOUBLES 2008

All income from entry fees & raffle to the Auckland Down Syndrome Association inc.

Sunday 16th November 2008 at Herne Bay PC, Salisbury Road, Auckland City

Prizes: Top four teams in the main all get engraved trophies plus winning team gets 36 bottles of wine, runners-up 24 bottles, losing semi-finalists get 12 bottles per team. Plate prizes are similar with all teams getting engraved trophies and winning team getting 24 bottles of wine, second gets 12 bottles, losing semi-finalists 6 bottles each. The numbers of bottles quoted here are the MINUMUM and it is hoped there will be more!

Raffle: each team is asked to bring one raffle prize and in addition there are amazing prizes that have been donated by New Zealand companies and individuals.

The competition is being run by Dave Ciano (UK and Cockle Bay) with the support of the Herne Bay Petanque Club. Info and Contact : voyk @ orcon.net.nz

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Creative my gaiters!

Finally! Adobe's CS4 is here, and to be fair, it looks better than ever. My only complaint is that the combination of products in the creative suite families are as always arranged kind of arbitrarily or are just inadequate for me. Why would I want to pay for 3 or 4 applications I want, and get 6 I don't need. Wouldn't it be more useful to have a selection system like: you can choose any 4, 5, 7 ,9 or 13 applications for a fixed price? That way, everyone would get what they really want. The way it is now, I bet that many people are forced to get a weird suite and then buy something separately... and not many have the money to get the "master's suite". I don't.

There's another complaint actually. The price of those things! Yes, it may be adequate for large corporations, but small businesses like small design studios can't afford to buy 3 or 4 licenses, that's like their full income for the whole year! No wonder that many studios use hacked software. My approach: I don't have any hacked software on my computer. I'm surviving with freeware like gimp and open office. The old software I bought doesn't work anymore or works partially on OSX10.5 like my old Photoshop elements doesn't even start. When software applications have a reasonable price, well, there's no excuse for pirates... but when prices are like that, one wonders who's the real pirate.

And well, there's a third complaint: despite having a reasonable affordable price, the new photoshop elements 6.0 for mac seems to be horrible. So much, that most of the comments on the apple store are people who asked for their money back... Now, I'm totally scared by those comments, and seems that I was waiting in vain all this time. Almost a year ago I said that I was concerned that the new PSE looked like it was going to be made for "stupid users"... and it seems I was right. So, I have no other option but to win the lottery or get me a guardian angel sponsor so I can buy me one of those creative suites, just to have the full "real" photoshop, and update my old marcomedia studio MX. That's sadly the thing with computers, is the never ending story of money being sucked in.

Speaking of software, I received Yesterdei this newsletter from pinnacle... well, it's not too late for "Hoi ultimo dia".

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