Wind Tower & Wind Wand
Kinetic art installations at the windiest location in Shanghai, the site of the WLA Artificial Intelligence Lab.
The wind tower, located at the nexus of the most intense winds, features a deteriorating column of cubic wind vane elements that follow the wind direction through drag. The windvane petals are painted in contrasting colors, revealing warm orange or sky-blue palettes as the prevailing wind direction changes.
In a more classical position on axis with the canal entrance, BAM designed a wind-wand device based on an inverted asymmetric balance design. The studio developed hanging models in various compositions that were then flipped along their centroids to a standing, compression state and modeled for 3D fiberglass printing. The wind wand includes wind-finding and spinning elements that describe wind velocity and features an onboard digital wind panel indicating accurate wind speed through anode connections. Cubes from the wind tower reappear throughout the ground floor, complementing swaying grasses and leaves of the landscape with abstract sculptural forms moving with the wind and changing colors by season.
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To connect the data and wind collection more concretely with local culture and the specific function of this building, we engraved the base of the wind wand with a quote attributed to Confucius: “To learn without thinking is blindness, to think without learning is idleness.” The strikingly science-like kinetic art piece, which is ostensibly a wind-reading device but is designed more as an idiosyncratic or even illogical tool—reminiscent of a folly in a garden—presents a third alternative to the Confucian dialectic: the idea of thinking logically without practicality and being driven solely by curiosity. Where does this fit within the Confucian spectrum, and what does this riposte to the Confucian quote mean for the researchers themselves?
LOCATION: Shanghai
Client: Parkland Group
TYPE: Art Installation
YEAR: 2023-2024
STATUS: Completed
COLLABORATORS: Urban Art Projects (Fabrication)