2024 — 315” x 276” x 5” — Wood, string, pulleys, steel, two electric motors.
I am thrilled to introduce a new kinetic sculpture! It is at a soon to be disclosed location in the Netherlands – stay tuned for more details! It has taken years of coordination, but being included early in the process allowed us to achieve a degree of architectural integration not otherwise possible. I couldn’t be happier with how it turned out. Confluence means the zone where two currents come together. I think of it as a place of cooperation. I look forward to sharing more details and thanking all of the folks who contributed both brains and muscles to making this sculpture happen.
When I first saw images of the lobby in a rendering by the architect, I was struck by the beauty of the space. I love the natural light, the high triangular wood ceiling and the vertical wood paneling. After some discussion we settled on a large wall as the location for the artwork, and I set about designing something that could be considered both a meditation and a finely crafted and well-engineered mathematical expression. I had just finished a small sculpture called Interlaced, and I wondered if it would be possible to reimagine this movement at a monumental scale. There were quite a few challenges. With the larger forces I couldn’t just direct the strings through rounded eyes, but instead had to run them through hundreds of large diameter ball bearing pulleys. I also had to come up with a different weave pattern that could be done in layers to avoid string crossings during installation. To keep the waveform planar, but allow the necessary range of vertical motion, I wondered if a loose-fitting tongue-and-groove profile for the wooden elements might work.
I’m always looking for an excuse to do a math problem, and this sculpture started with a fascinating one. I began my design by looking into the general solution to the path a string takes given an arbitrary arrangement of ordered pulleys. It turns out that with n number of pulleys there is 2 to the n possible paths, with the shortest being the correct route. This meant that I could define pulleys by coordinates, and then quickly calculate the string path between them. I worked out the math in python which allowed me to draw the layout using matplotlib, as well as calculate the force vectors that would later be needed for structural engineering.
My next step was to do the final structural engineering, and I worked with Rob Otani at Thornton Tomasetti to analyze the stresses in the steel bars that would hold the pulleys, and specify the bolts required to secure the sculpture to the concrete wall. Then I got to work and fabricated all the components in my studio in California. I was happy to get welding help from my friend Ian Urban. I powder coated the steel rings and bars that hold all the pulleys the exact same color as the wall. There was no way to fully assemble the sculpture prior to installation and so I tested the various components as best I could, double checked my math, triple checked my math, and then packed everything in seven crates and shipped it to the Netherlands in an ocean container.
When the space was ready in October 2024 I flew over and the general contractors provided two scissor lifts, two electricians, and three people to help me install. It was about the smoothest and most fun installation I’ve ever done! It was a great experience I’m grateful for all the folks over the years that made this project so much fun. I will update this page once the building is officially open, so stay tuned for more details!
The video below shows a time-lapse of the installation