Heyl & Van Dam
Cosmobloom is a handmade kinetic sculpture, which responds interactively to its audience. In harmonic motion it reflects light and colour while transitioning between states of closed and secure to open and vulnerable. It is constructed with layers of mirror polished stainless steel fastened to an array of carefully detailed mechanical linkages. Drawing on architecture, materials and ecological issues, Cosmobloom mimics the circadian rhythm of a flower, opening and closing each day. A futuristic bloom, it moves reflections and light through the venue space in perpetual motion.
Drawing on Heyl & Van Dam’s combined experience in art, design, engineering and robotics, the pair set out to create a sculpture that generates a presence larger than its physical dimensions. While poetics and presence ground the conception, rigorous mechanical principles guide the form. Heyl’s experience as a robotics hardware engineer and Van Dam’s eye for detail has given birth to a sculpture which features highly detailed and complex motion paths.
Heyl & Van Dam are the artist duo Parker Heyl and Mac Van Dam. Parker Heyl (1993) is a designer, roboticist, artist, and teaching fellow on the Design for Performance and Interaction MArch at The Bartlett School of Architecture in London. He creates digital/analog hybrids which emphasise the aura of physical objects and seek to emancipate digital data from the screen. His works voluntarily relinquish computerized regulation in favour of an analog aesthetic. Before joining the Interactive Architecture Lab as a tutor and researcher, Parker worked as a roboticist at the Harvard iLab developing soft robotic technologies. He is trained as a carpenter and currently practices as a kinetic artist, designing installation work for contemporary galleries.
Mac Van Dam (1995) is a multi-disciplinary designer working in architecture, art, object design, and material science. His work is rooted in a material-led design process and a desire to bring biological/living sensibilities to the everyday. He is currently designing artworks (Heyl & Van Dam) and contemporary forms of urban green infrastructure (Vertical Grounds Design Lab). Before founding design studios in the UK, Mac was a research member/artist at the Living Architecture Systems Group in Toronto, and has worked at internationally acclaimed architecture firms. His work has been shown at the Lisbon Triennale, London Design Festival, Venice Biennale, Coachella, and several other international exhibitions.