REPORTS
YouFab Kick Off Party Report -Tokyo-
By FabCafe Tokyo
REPORTS
By FabCafe Tokyo
From left, Saki Chikaraishi, Aki Inomata, Masaaki Sugimoto of AgIC, and Executive Committee Chairman Toshiya Fukuda
Hello! This is Daiki from FabCafe.
Once again, here we are at this year’s “YouFab Global Creative Awards.”
To commemorate the start of work submissions, we held a special FabMeetup on July 8, and put on a party.
The “YouFab Global Creative Awards,” (hereafter referred to as YouFab) are a set of global creative awards to honor the most superior and challenging work in the field of digital fabrication. Submissions come from around the world, ranging from laser cutters and 3D printers, to artworks, products, and performances using digital fabrication.
At this event, titled “Creative x Technology,” we hosted a talk session.This discussion was conducted with last year’s YouFab 2014 Grand Prize winner Aki Inomata, runner-up Masaaki Sugimoto of AgIC, finalist Saki Chikaraishi, as well as FabCafe co-founder and YouFab Executive Committee Chairman Toshiya Fukuda.
The first presenter is Masaaki from AgIC, runner-up of YouFab 2014.
This project turns off-the-shelf home inkjet printers into print circuit boards with silver-based ink.
Masaaki introduced AgIC’s latest projects. He talked about the various installations and programs he has embarked upon, taking advantage of the technology to print onto paper forms. Using AgIC to frequently host electronic circuit workshops geared for children, he states, “we are mass producing kids who have built electronic circuits for the first time(laughs).” According to Masaaki, he is always thinking about ways to make children’s curiosity bloom just like in that moment when they first connect their own circuits. His own inspiration for creating AgIC was said to be because he could not suppress his own curiosity upon learning of the existence of silver ink with electrical conductive properties.
Masaaki wants to think about how he can make technology function in the service of food, clothing and shelter. He spoke about his wish to especially form collaborations in the field of “clothing,” focusing on developing wearable devices and textiles.
“Slice of Light” An interactive wallpaper designed in collaboration with # Beige. Exhibited at the Salone del Mobile in Milan, Italy in 2015. By day it’s a poster, and at night it functions as lighting, requiring only that it be hung on a wall and plugged into an electrical socket.
“Hana Akari (Flower Lights)” An installation designed on an India ink painting motif. A collaboration between Cupworks, Hana Lab, and AgIC. Exhibited at the Salone del Mobile in Milan, Italy in 2015.
Presenting next was the artist Aki Inomata, who won the YouFab 2014 Grand Prize.
Why Not Hand Over a “Shelter” to Hermut Crabs? is the work by Aki Inomata that got the Grand Prize of YouFab 2014.
Hermit crabs change their shells as they grow. Sometimes they are kicked out of their shelters by stronger hermit crabs and forced to exchange shells. Aki gave hermit crabs new shells that I had made for them with a 3D printer, and if they liked them, they moved into my “shelters”. The shelters that I made for them represent cities from around the world.
Aki Inomata has exhibited a great many works of art which explore involvement and cooperation with living things, and in regards to the self and others. For this event, she introduced her newest work, “LINES – Listening to the growth lines of shellfish ver.1.0.” For this project, she focused on the growth lines of the asari clam, which are inscribed annually like tree rings. By converting these growth lines into sound, she produced a log documenting the environmental changes to the asari clam’s habitat before and after the Great East Japan earthquake. (In her hand is a record of those sounds made by using a laser cutter)
Aki Inomata stated that for her next project, she would like to create a piece using the theme of biology and food. She also talked about her desire to experiment with intervention and alteration of the body using digital fabrication.
Our final speaker was the Hyper Knit Creator, Saki Chikaraishi.
The Travelling Knitting Machine is finalist work of YouFab 2014 by Saki Chikaraishi. It’s a combination of a suitcase and a knitting machine, as well as an artistic activity when travelling with it in tow It uses the energy of the wheels spinning to knit, so the more movement there is, the more knitting is done. Then, when I meet people along my journey, I wrapped the knitted product around them snuggly. By making the invisible concept of distance visible, I hope I can let the people wrapped up in the knit freely imagine the place where it began to be knitted, and the path that it has taken. The concept of this project is to invite people on a journey of imagination while being snuggled in a knit.
In creating her recent work “Knit Invador,” Saki gained a very strong impression in the enveloping of not just things, but of entire areas. She spoke of her future activity to endeavor to “envelop the Kansai area in knitting.” We look forward to seeing what kind of project that will become.
“When new technologies emerge, somebody needs to translate them. These 3 creators here are proficient at using such technologies, as if to say to themselves, ‘this is how I would use this technology!’ And that is their mission. YouFab’s mission is the same. To translate and communicate this new technology of digital fabrication. Otherwise, technology will just wither away and die,” says YouFab Awards Executive Committee Chairman Toshiya Fukuda.
How would you translate the technologies that are now in front of you?
This year’s YouFab entry submissions will be accepted until September 30, 2015. You still have plenty of time left. What kinds of projects will be submitted from around the world, and what kinds of new forms of expression will they reveal to us? What kind of future will they convey? We eagerly await your submissions.
YouFab Global Creative Awards 2015 website
