At last we’ve begun: after a hectic week of getting everything and everyone together. Let’s see if such a collaborative endeavor, working together on a tightly integrated bio-technological system delivers new insights. Insights that could help us shape participation to produce robust, resilient and at the same highly adaptive systems with strong regenerative properties. (This is only my interpretation of indispensable requirements for sustainable systems, besides that it should maximize the benefit the three p’s generate.) How are we going to see that biomodding generates new insights? Three main techniques participant observation, introspection and a technique called cognitive mapping (see how marketing education can pay off ;-) to see if more and new concepts have ‘attached’ themselves in the minds of participants to concepts central to biomodding. We’ll keep you posted!

Posted by Jaco Appelman

Today the new international Biomodd team started working at the Technological University of Delft to create an upgraded edition of the Biomodd project. The team consists of a mixed group of engineers, programmers and artists from the Netherlands, Belgium, Slovenia, Turkey, Iran and China. The main goal is to implement some of the technologies present at the university into the art work, such as augmented reality, artificial intelligence, and aerospace engineering. There's only two weeks of development time before the first presentation, so things need to go quick. We started the day by taking apart a good amount of computers, and introducing people to the basics of computer building. After that we went to the thrift store to shop for 'construction supplies', and built a first operational prototype. We also started brainstorming about the actual physical structure or backbone of this Biomodd. It should be mobile, modular, and possibly reach up to the balcony of the first floor. The advantage of a mobile and modular structure is that we'll be able to easily showcase it in other locations afterwards. Tomorrow we'll be refining the proposals. There's clearly a lot of local interest in the project since students drop by to explore the workspace almost continuously.


Team members working on ideas for the main structure of Biomodd.

Posted by Angelo Vermeulen

On Sunday October 2 several Belgian online news sites announced the new Biomodd project in Delft. The articles focus mostly on the augmented reality technology that will become integrated in close collaboration with the Augmented Reality Lab of TU Delft. This is from the newspaper De Morgen: "Aan de Technische Universiteit van Delft gaat de Belgische kunstenaar-bioloog Angelo Vermeulen morgen een vernieuwde versie van zijn kunstproject Biomodd uitwerken. Dat kunstwerk bestaat uit een mini-ecosysteem van planten en gerecycleerde computers waarbij de opgewekte hitte van de computers gebruikt wordt om planten te doen groeien. Hij wil nu de mogelijkheden van augmented reality integreren in dat concept. [...] Het Biomodd-project werd eerder al op poten gezet in de Verenigde Staten, de Filipijnen, België, Slovenië en Nieuw-Zeeland. Aan de vernieuwde versie in Delft zal een team van ruim twintig ingenieurs en kunstenaars meewerken." Read the full article here.

Tomorrow Angelo Vermeulen will give an artist talk for Studium Generale at TU Delft. The Biomodd concept will be elucidated through an illustrated overview of the different versions created worldwide over the past 4 years. Angelo will also discuss the preliminary plans for the upcoming version in Delft, and explain how to participate. The presentation starts at 12:45pm. Address: TB Café at the Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management, Jaffalaan 5, Delft.