Dezeen Magazine features Smoke and Mirrors at SXSW'24
Methane data and dishonest oil company advertising are juxtaposed in Smoke and Mirrors, a new visualisation produced by artist and musician Beatie Wolfe
Beatie Wolfe visualises oil industry "disinformation" in Smoke and Mirrors video
Rima Sabina Aouf | 21 March 2024 5 comments
Methane data and dishonest oil company advertising are juxtaposed in Smoke and Mirrors, a new visualisation produced by artist and musician Beatie Wolfe in collaboration with visual effects studio Parliament.
Debuting last week at South by Southwest, Smoke and Mirrors doubles as a video clip for Wolfe's song Oh My Heart, which was released in 2022 on the world's first bioplastic vinyl.
While plumes of brown gas slowly engulf an image of planet Earth, the video displays phrases like "out to clean our air", "unsettled science" and "don't risk our future" – all slogans used in oil industry advertising from 1970 to today.
The final text overlay reads "net-zero" and beneath it "achieving net-zero emissions is part of our powering progress strategy", and is from a 2023 Shell ad.
"Smoke and Mirrors is about visualising not just the methane data (smoke) in a way people can really absorb but also the disinformation (mirrors), which has caused the data to be denied, doubted and delayed through the decades," Wolfe told Dezeen.
Smoke and Mirrors follows another climate-themed interactive video installation Wolfe made in 2021, which used her song From Green to Red and was displayed at COP26.
Still from Smoke and Mirrors showing an image of the planet Earth overlaid with text reading 'Out to clean the air'
The piece features lines from oil company advertising
Wolfe said the idea for Smoke and Mirrors came after seeing how that project "helped people to see the data differently and to absorb it via the power of art".
"Realising that a big piece of the climate puzzle (how we got to this critical point) has been the fossil fuel industry's response to the emerging environmental awareness of the 1970s and that methane emissions (30 times more potent than carbon for trapping heat) are increasingly linked with that industry, I wanted to illuminate this key parallel timeline," she said.
"With From Green to Red, it was about looking at 800,000 years of rising CO2 levels, while this is about looking at just 50/60 years of rising methane levels but set alongside the advertising campaigns that have been running during this critical period in human history," Wolfe continued.
The smoke visualisation in the video represents methane entering into Earth's atmosphere while a counter at the top of the visualisation shows the levels quickly going up in parts per billion (ppb).
Still from Smoke and Mirrors showing a planet Earth clogged with brown gas and the words 'oil pumps life' overlaid on top
The piece also visualises atmospheric methane level data
The methane data comes from NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), two US government agencies. The research on oil company advertising was undertaken by Wolfe, who credits work done by academics Geoffrey Supran and Naomi Oreskes as helping "enormously".
The way the Earth is visualised is based on NASA's famous Blue Marble photograph, taken from space.
A dedicated website for Smoke and Mirrors expands on the data and research included in the video.
Wolfe is a singer-songwriter known for integrating music and art, often by pioneering new formats for audio. In addition to From Green to Red, her previous work has included an album presented as a deck of cards.
SXSW 2024 takes place from 8 to 16 March 2024 at various locations in Austin, USA. See Dezeen Events Guide for an up-to-date list of architecture and design events taking place around the world.
Dezeen Magazine features Wolfe's pavilion
As on of the 10 standout pavilions of London Design Biennale 2023
Dezeen Magazine feature bioplastic 12-inch vinyl featuring Beatie Wolfe and Michael Stipe
Evolution Music creates "ecologically sound" bioplastic 12-inch vinyl featuring artists Beatie Wolfe and Michael Stipe
Jane Englefield | 18 September 2022 1 comment
Music and sustainability collective Evolution Music has designed a 12-inch vinyl made of bioplastic using existing record pressing machinery, which features tracks by artists Beatie Wolfe and Michael Stipe.
Hailed as the world's first commercially available bioplastic 12-inch vinyl by Evolution Music, the product is made from specially designed bioplastic instead of traditional, carbon-intensive PVC.
The 12-inch vinyl is made from bioplastic created by Evolution Music
The bioplastic 12-inch vinyl looks and functions like a standard vinyl, comprised of a black disc illustrated with a central graphic design.
It was manufactured using existing record pressing machinery and production processes.
It is manufactured using existing record pressing machinery
Its A-side features the track Future, If Future by American musician Stipe, while Oh My Heart by British-American artist Wolfe can be played on its B-side.
The bioplastic 12-inch vinyl's creators said that they were prompted to design the material and the product themselves after struggling to find "sustainable solutions for physical media".
"It is a robust, ecologically secure compostable material created specifically to act and sound the same as PVC-derived vinyl," Evolution Music CEO Marc Carey told Dezeen.
Tracks by Michael Stipe and Beatie Wolfe feature on the record
To create the bioplastic, a four-year development process involved identifying a base polymer that acts in the same way as traditional PVC, without producing harmful substances, according to Carey.
After this, the team sourced bio-organic fillers and co-created a solid additive used for plastics called a bio masterbatch.
Evolution Music's aim was "to create a biopolymer that is authentic, truly sustainable and ecologically sound," explained Carey.
"We've never developed traditional plastic vinyl – I guess you should ask the PVC manufacturers why they didn't [create bioplastic vinyl]," he said.
Evolution Music aimed to create a "sustainable" product
Five hundred copies of the bioplastic 12-inch vinyl were initially sold when it was released earlier this year, with the proceeds donated to the charity EarthPercent.
Founded by musician Brian Eno, EarthPercent invites artists to pledge a portion of their income to the charity, which is then donated to organisations that tackle climate change.
The release of the bioplastic 12-inch vinyl forms part of a Bandcamp project by EarthPercent that includes over 100 tracks by artists including Hot Chip, Peter Gabriel and Nile Rogers.
"It took three passionate, independent music lovers from the UK to develop this product out of necessity," concluded Carey.
"The fact that 'big' players did not do this in the first place raises interesting questions about the petrol, chemical, oil and plastics industry... just saying!"
Other recent bioplastic designs include a clingfilm alternative made from waste potato peels and a polystyrene substitute created from plastic-eating mealworms.
The images are courtesy of Evolution Music.
Read more:
Dezeen Magazine highlights Beatie Wolfe COP26 Projection which visualises rising CO2 levels
Dezeen’s Editor Tom Ravenscroft talks about Beatie Wolfe’s COP26 projected artwork, From Green to Red, onto the SEC Armadillo, a 3,000-seat venue designed by Foster + Partners
Beatie Wolfe visualises rising CO2 levels on Glasgow's Armadillo building at COP26
Beatie Wolfe projects climate change artwork on COP26 venue
Musician and artist Beatie Wolfe projected her artwork From Green to Red onto the SEC Armadillo, a 3,000-seat venue designed by Foster + Partners.
The projection, which reaches 34 metres in height and covers the entire facade of the distinctive building, visualises rising levels of CO2 in the atmosphere based on 800,000 years of NASA data. An interactive version of the video installation was previewed exclusively on Dezeen last year as part of Virtual Design Festival.
"With this projection I wanted people to be able to see something that is often hard to visualise – that of rising CO2 levels – and for it to activate awareness in a way that goes in deep and imprints," Wolfe told Dezeen. "And COP26 is the most impactful setting for this large-scale environmental protest piece."
The SEC Armadillo, named for its resemblance to the armoured mammal, is part of the Scottish Event Campus where the COP26 conference is taking place.
Dezeen Magazine features From Green to Red at the London Design Biennale
Editor Marcus Fairs sits shared musician and artist Beatie Wolfe interactive video installation depicting rising carbon levels in the atmosphere
Musician and artist Beatie Wolfe has created an interactive video installation depicting rising carbon levels in the atmosphere.
Called From Green to Red, the video acts as a soundtrack to a Beatie Wolfe song of the same name that is about climate change. The project aims to "take intangible data and make it something that people can relate to," Wolfe told Dezeen.
Dezeen feature Mothersbaugh/Wolfe's project in best 6 vote designs
Eleanor Gibson highlights Postcards for Democracy in her “six designs to encourage voting in 2020 US presidential election” article
The Postcards for Democracy project aims to encourage voting
Six designs to encourage voting in 2020 US presidential election
Eleanor Gibson
As the US presidential election on 3 November approaches, we've rounded up six designs that aim to motivate people to vote, including Instagram gifs, brass pins, billboards and magazine covers.
Postcards for Democracy by Beatie Wolfe and Mark Mothersbaugh
Singer-songwriter Beatie Wolfe teamed up with artist Mark Mothersbaugh to launch Postcards for Democracy in support of the USPS amid a crisis that saw delays in delivery that could have impacted people's ability to vote.
Wolfe and Mothersbaugh asked participants to mail postcards to a set address, which would then be used as part of a wider exhibition.
Read article here (+)
Virtual Design Festival - Week 2 Round Up
Week two round up, Virtual Design Festival featured interviews with Ron Arad, a live performance by Beatie Wolfe and takeovers by MAAT and The World Around
Last week, Virtual Design Festival featured interviews with Ron Arad, a live performance by Beatie Wolfe and takeovers by MAAT and The World Around.
Highlights include…
Friday 24 April: Beatie Wolfe documentary launch and live performance
Los Angeles musician Beatie Wolfe put together Friday's programme, which included a live interview and performance, plus the online premiere of her Orange Juice for the Ears documentary.
Live | Interview & Performance | Virtual Design Festival | Dezeen
As the final part of today's VDF x Beatie Wolfe collaboration, the musician speaks live to Dezeen founder Marcus Fairs before performing three of her tracks.
Live interview followed by exclusive performance by singer-songwriter Beatie Wolfe
As the final part of today's VDF x Beatie Wolfe collaboration, the musician speaks live to Dezeen founder Marcus Fairs before performing three of her tracks.
In a specially pre-recorded performance from her Los Angeles home studio, Wolfe performs three of her tracks: As You, What I Feel Inside and Oh My Heart.
The performance concludes the day-long collaboration with Wolfe that also featured the online premiere of the Orange Juice for the Ears documentary about her work, an exclusive preview of her upcoming From Green to Red installation, and an essay about the power of music to help people through difficult times.
About Virtual Design Festival
Virtual Design Festival runs from 15 April to 30 June 2020. It intends to bring the architecture and design world together to celebrate the culture and commerce of our industry, and explore how it can adapt and respond to extraordinary circumstances.
Essay | The Art of Imprinting in the Digital Age | Virtual Design Festival | Dezeen
“For her collaboration with VDF, singer-songwriter Beatie Wolfe has written an essay about the power of music to transform lives, particularly during difficult times.” Marcus Fairs
"Music is core to our humanity" writes Beatie Wolfe in an essay exploring tangible formats for music in the digital age
For her collaboration with VDF, singer-songwriter Beatie Wolfe has written an essay about the power of music to transform lives, particularly during difficult times.
Titled The Art of Imprinting in the Digital Age, the essay explores the notion of how to make music more tangible at a time when it has become a digital commodity, as well as discussing the importance of storytelling and ceremony in music.
The Art of Imprinting in the Digital Age
Hi, I'm Beatie Wolfe, an artist and innovator and I create new tangible formats for albums in the digital age. I'm also co-founder of a research project looking at the power of music as medicine.
I first met Dezeen's founder Marcus Fairs during a BBC radio interview where he was ill and I had vertigo, and at that time I was about to open a solo exhibition of my world-first album designs at the Victoria & Albert Museum, which was a great life highlight and a huge honour.
So I wanted to share some of my thoughts on the subject of the power of music and art to us all. Perhaps especially in light of these times.
Opening story
I've always loved the stories of albums, the tangibility of records and the ceremony of listening. From the time I started writing songs aged eight and discovered my parents' vinyl collection, I saw records as musical books, with the artwork providing the perfect backdrop for the music, and I loved opening them up and entering into the world of the album. There was also a ritual to the occasion.
photo by Ross Harris
Wolfe started writing songs aged eight
From that age I started imagining what my album could look like, what it could feel like, what worlds I could create. When it was time for my first album to be released, it was a very different era with the digital replacing the physical. So I thought about how to connect the two and that's what my work became centred around. Reimagining the vinyl experience but for today.
Art is core to our humanity
Why was this so important to me? Because music IS core to our humanity. We are a musical species more than anything else and music imprints on the brain deeper than any other human experience.
I believe that there are three things that allow something to go deep, to stay with us and forever change us. These are tangibility, storytelling and ceremony.
Related story
VDF premieres Beatie Wolfe's documentary Orange Juice for the Ears
Tangibility as in a physical art form or space to explore. This could be a record jacket or the world's quietest room. Anything that grounds us in our present reality through a physical touchpoint.
Storytelling in the broadest sense of the word, the ability for the artist or creator to tell a story through their work that can engage the imagination and transport us.
And lastly but perhaps most importantly: Ceremony, the space around and within the experience that allows us to go deep, to be fully immersed.
I believe that these three things set the stage for the music and allow it to imprint. Imprint so that every one of these experiences becomes a part of who we are and what we carry with us. This doesn't just apply to music but to everything and anything that helps to reconnect us with ourselves and one another. It's these experiences that keep us alive inside.
What threatens these values today?
Tangibility, storytelling and ceremony had always been part of the physical music listening experience and were just some of the things we lost when we moved to digital.
The digital era created access, it presented solutions but it also created an idea that we could fast track a lot of what defined us as humans to begin with and without the true cost or value reflected in the process.
photo by Stu Nicholls
Music has become part of a constant background chatter, argues Wolfe
Music now floats around in its intangible sphere along with everything else that sits there: news notifications, calendar alerts, social media. Everything occupying this same superficial stream of information that infiltrates our day-to-day lives, bombarding our sensory systems until we are numb, overloaded and fatigued. Music, and art, have become part of that constant background chatter and we have forgotten why they are so much more.
There is a fine balance between what needs to be innovated and what needs to be preserved. So how do we reconcile the value of music and art today with an industry that has decided that albums are obsolete and singles need not be more than jingles; forgotten as easily as they are created? The opposite of imprinting.
Looking to neurology
I found part of my answer in neurology. The great late Oliver Sacks studied the power of music extensively and grounded what a lot of us feel intuitively about music, in science. In Musicophilia, his book about music and the brain, Sacks documents the impact of music for every neurological condition from Parkinson's to Alzheimer's, autism to schizophrenia, showing how music is a remedy, a tonic, an orange juice for the ears.
And I realised that there was no greater application of music than this: using music to reconnect us with ourselves and one another when nothing else could.
A seed was planted in the back of my mind and when I found out that my grandmother had been diagnosed with dementia I decided to take my guitar with me the next time I visited her and play her some songs… because why not?
Orange juice for the ears
Watching my grandmother transform from agitated and confused to joyful and at ease with just a song moved me so deeply. Then I decided to play to my father-in-law at his care home in Portugal and when the home director asked if I wouldn't mind playing to everyone in the ward with dementia and Alzheimer's, of course, I agreed. Realising that my songs would be unfamiliar to the residents and that no one in the home spoke any English (except for my relative) I was expecting a nice ambience at best.
Related story
From Green to Red is "part music video, part protest song and entirely a statement of our time" says Beatie Wolfe
However, as I played and saw people waking up, clapping along, even dancing in their chairs and becoming visibly reanimated from the music, just as Sacks had described, I realised that something much more important was happening.
And then the director informed me in the 10 years he had been there it was the best he had seen the group.
Something was crystalizing into view. What if music's power was so strong, so interlinked with our own sense of self and wellbeing, that with even the memory component removed it could be a tonic, a remedy, a "way in". What if it was the music and not the memory making the magic? In Musicophilia, Sacks had theorized that "music does not have to be familiar to exert its emotional pull" but he had not tested this. I had seen the tip of precisely this and wanted to see how much deeper it went.
The research and charity
Inspired by this insight, back in the UK I began the Power of Music and Dementia research project with the Utley Foundation in 2014 with the intention of recreating what had happened naturally in Portugal but this time with the right controls in place and the caregivers and doctors monitoring the residents. I went into care homes all across the UK and performed an original set of my songs while the residents were monitored both during the live performance and the weeks following as they listened to the same songs on headsets.
The results were amazing. Both memory and communication were improved during the duration of the project and I witnessed some of the most profound reactions to music I have ever seen. Reactions that imprinted on me forever.
I watched David transform from a catatonic-like state to dancing. And Anne, who had not spoken a word in seven months, halfway through the performance broke into song. Every one of these breakthroughs felt like the most vital link in the chain of our understanding about what moves us, what restores us, what makes us uniquely human.
Photo by Veanne Cao
Wolfe is an ambassador for charity MusicforDementia2020
What began as a small research study in the UK was suddenly getting global attention and I found myself sitting with the world's top neurologists and researchers as they picked my brain on the subject. And all because I asked a question; not as a doctor, but as a musician.
Today music for dementia is becoming a global movement. The charity, MusicForDementia2020, (established out of my project) is now actively working to get music in all care homes in the UK by the end of this year and I continue to work with them as an ambassador.
Keeping alive inside
So what did this teach me? It taught me to celebrate the experiences that keep us alive inside, that remind us of why we are here in the first place. At a time of more access than ever, how can we retain a sense of value? How can we choose to carve out deeper, more ceremonial, moments in amongst the noise? How can we protect those endangered experiences that become our touchpoints, that shape our emotional sensibility, our identity, our wellbeing and create vast canyons and reserves in our very being?
We realise the importance of these choices when we realise the intrinsic value of music, and art, to us all as sentient beings. When you have witnessed the power of music as medicine in this pure and concentrated way, which cannot be staged or fabricated. It either works or it doesn't. When you see what music can do, when even language and memory are removed from the folds; see how the first few notes evokes a smile, a hand twitch, instantly, effortlessly, and this builds and grows and it's just them and the music. No tangible memories, no time and place. Just them and the music.
And suddenly the brain opens up like a flower, gently unfurling, presenting new pathways you never believed were there… until you realise that music is a necessity for those living with dementia because music is a necessity for every one of us.
Art | From Green to Red | Virtual Design Festival | Dezeen
As part of the VDF collaboration with Beatie Wolfe, the singer-songwriter has shared this exclusive preview of From Green to Red, a forthcoming interactive environmental protest installation.
From Green to Red is "part music video, part protest song and entirely a statement of our time" says Beatie Wolfe
As part of the VDF collaboration with Beatie Wolfe, the singer-songwriter has shared this exclusive preview of From Green to Red, a forthcoming interactive environmental protest installation.
Created for this year's London Design Biennale, the project sets to music NASA data showing how atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide have increased over the past 800,000 years.
From Green to Red is an interactive environmental protest installation by singer-songwriter Beatie Wolfe
For VDF, Wolfe has prepared a special movie preview of the installation. This features a digital timeline that visualises the dramatic increase in CO2 in the atmosphere over the preceding 8,000 centuries, "reimagining both the music-video format and protest song," according to Wolfe.
"A statement of our time"
"It's part music video, part protest song and entirely a statement of our time," said Wolfe.
The title of the project comes from Wolfe's track From Green To Red, which explores climate-change denial and which Wolfe wrote after seeing the 2006 climate-change documentary An Inconvenient Truth.
Related story
Lockdown is an "exercise in presence and gratitude" says Beatie Wolfe
"We don’t want to hear that the problem is us," Wolfe sings in the track. "So we live like we want in our own universe."
From Green To Red has been produced in collaboration with visual-effects studio The Mill and will premiere at the 2020 London Design Biennale, which is due to take place at Somerset House in London from 8 to 27 September 2020 and is directed this year by theatre designer Es Devlin.
Interactive installation will give visitors "a sense of agency"
"For the fully immersive From Green To Red experience, people will be able to interact with the piece in real-time via its motion sensors," Wolfe said. "As people approach the installation, both the music and timeline visualisation will respond, becoming clearer and sharper and revealing new factors and elements, allowing people to play with and explore the data."
"This has the effect of giving each individual a sense of agency about their own impact on the environment."
The project sets to music NASA data visualising how atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide have increased over the past 800,000 years
The From Green To Red preview is part of a day-long VDF collaboration with Los Angeles-based Wolfe, who has been described as "a singer-songwriter of raw acoustic indie channelling Leonard Cohen and Elliott Smith" who "pioneers new formats for music."
The collaboration includes the online premiere of the Orange Juice for the Ears: from Space Beams to Anti-Streams documentary about Wolfe's work and a live interview and performance.
About Virtual Design Festival
Virtual Design Festival runs from 15 April to 30 June 2020. The world's first online design festival will bring the architecture and design world together to celebrate the culture and commerce of our industry, and explore how it can adapt and respond to extraordinary circumstances.
Artist Welcome | Virtual Design Festival | Dezeen
Ahead of today's VDF collaboration with Beatie Wolfe, the musician says that the coronavirus lockdown is a chance to celebrate "the little things that are so often overlooked" in this video message for Virtual Design Festival.
Lockdown is an "exercise in presence and gratitude" says Beatie Wolfe
Ahead of today's VDF collaboration with Beatie Wolfe, the musician says that the coronavirus lockdown is a chance to celebrate "the little things that are so often overlooked" in this video message for Virtual Design Festival.
"I've been finding this time to be a great exercise in presence and gratitude," she said in the video filmed in Los Angeles.
Wolfe, who has been described as a "musical weirdo and visionary", will be sharing her music and artworks with Virtual Design Festival today.
Her programme will start at 11:00am UK time with the online premiere of the singer-songwriter's documentary Orange Juice for the Ears and culminate at 5:00pm with a live interview and performance. You can see the schedule of the day here.
Wolfe is a Los Angeles-based musician and artist. She has previously created a set of business-card-sized vinyl records embedded with a near-field communication (NFC) chip, which listeners tap against a smartphone to play.
Related story
Beatie Wolfe's "intelligent" Raw Space album features songs embedded in business cards
Wolfe's video message features in Dezeen's launch movie for Virtual Design Festival, for which she provided the soundtrack. Her messages features alongside contributions from 34 other architects, designers and artists in lockdown around the world, including Stefano Giovanni, Es Devlin, Ini Archibong, Ben van Berkel and Bec Brittain. You can watch the full movie here.
Send us a video message
Dezeen invited architects, designers, artists and industry figures to record video messages from lockdown and made a montage of 35 video messages to launch Virtual Design Festival.
We'll be posting an individual video message each day. Check them out here. To submit your own message, see the brief here.
About Virtual Design Festival
Virtual Design Festival runs from 15 April to 30 June 2020. It intends to bring the architecture and design world together to celebrate the culture and commerce of our industry, and explore how it can adapt and respond to extraordinary circumstances.
Virtual Design Festival - week two schedule
Virtual Design Festival week two highlights include SO-IL, Ron Arad and Beatie WolfeVirtual Design Festival week two includes SO-IL, Ron Arad and Beatie Wolfe
Benedict Hobson | 20 April 2020 Leave a comment
Week two of Virtual Design Festival features an architecture photography festival, a celebration of Earth Day, interviews with SO-IL and Ron Arad and a live music performance by Beatie Wolfe. Here's what's coming up this week.
Further details will be added as we confirm them. Click here for the full schedule of everything taking place between 15 April and June 30, including links to things that have already happened. See last week's highlights. All times are UK times.
Monday 20 April // VDF x MAAT
Lisbon's Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology (MAAT) takes over VDF for the day, presenting three exclusive videos about the Beeline installation by SO-IL and the accompanying exhibition Currents – Temporary Architectures by SO-IL, plus a live interview with SO-IL founders Florian Idenburg and Jing Liu.
11:00am Exclusive premiere of video about SO-IL's Beeline installation
1:00pm Premiere of a documentary about MAAT's Currents exhibition about SO-IL
2:00pm Live interview with SO-IL and MAAT executive director Beatrice Leanza
4:00pm Sneak peek of the Currents exhibition of SO-IL's temporary work
Tuesday 21 April // VDF x Zoomed In
We team up with new architecture photography festival Zoomed In for a series of talks and screenings celebrating architecture's image-makers.
11:00am Photographing infrastructure panel discussion
2:00pm Talk about the human landscape in architecture
5:00pm Panel discussion on images and the media
7:00pm Screening by View Pictures
Wednesday 22 April //VDF x The World Around x Earth Day
The World Around curates a celebration of Earth Day on Dezeen. The World Around founder Beatrice Galilee will host a series of interviews with architects and visionaries working on environmental issues around the world.
More details: theworldaround.com
Thursday 23 April // VDF x Ron Arad
Ron Arad will present a digital version of an exhibition called DFWTM (top image) that was due to be held at OTI gallery in Los Angeles, but which has been cancelled due to coronavirus. More details TBC.
Friday 24 April //VDF x Beatie Wolfe
Beatie Wolfe, who has been described as a "musical weirdo and visionary," shares her music and artworks with VDF, and will conduct a live interview and performance. More details TBC.
Guardian feature Beatie Wolfe's Virtual Design Festival day
Other talks include those from Design Indaba and Stockholm, San Francisco and Vienna Design Weeks, the Serpentine Gallery, the London Festival of Architecture and New York architecture conference The World Around.
The global design community has collaborated to launch the first virtual design festival in response to the coronavirus lockdown. Products and talks from the schedules of Design Indaba and Stockholm, San Francisco and Vienna Design Weeks will appear alongside performances and exhibitions from the Serpentine Gallery, the London Festival of Architecture and New York architecture conference The World Around. All have been closed or cancelled due to Covid-19. The Virtual Design Festival (VDF) – which runs from 15 April to 30 June – was conceived by the team at interiors and architecture digital magazine Dezeen.
“The architecture and design world has been affected by the pandemic, with key trade events and festivals cancelled and practitioners having to find new ways to sustain their business,” says Marcus Fairs, editor-in-chief of Dezeen. “It felt natural to come up with an online platform to showcase projects and connect architects, designers, and creatives across the globe.”
Planned events include gigs by award-winning experimental singer-songwriter Beatie Wolfe and pianist and sound designer Rosey Chan, a programme of interviews organised by New York’s The Metropolitan Museum of Arts architecture and design curator Beatrice Galilee for Earth Day (22 April) and a digital exhibition of work created by architect and artist Ron Arad, who calls the VDF “a great initiative to bring us together at this extraordinary time”. Arad’s pieces are from his DFWTM series of artworks (a set of 20 fibreglass seat-like structures). “There’s a piece I made on 31 January – the day we left the EU. I bought the newspapers of the day – all screaming Brexit – on the way to the studio. They were cut, torn and embedded in unset polyester. We thought we were ‘freezing’ the most life-changing day in the UK. Little did we know.”
The Virtual Design Festival runs from 15 April to 30 June.
Dezeen announce the Virtual Design Festival with Beatie Wolfe day
The Design Museum, Dutch Design Week, Design Indaba, Ventura Projects and The World Around are among cultural partners who will be contributing to Virtual Design Festival, which launches on 15 April. Creative partners include designer Ron Arad, artist Lucy McRae, and Beatie Wolfe
Virtual Design Festival partners with Ron Arad, Li Edelkoort, Dutch Design Week, Serpentine Galleries and more on digital cultural programme.
The Design Museum, Dutch Design Week, Design Indaba, Ventura Projects and The World Around are among cultural partners who will be contributing to Virtual Design Festival, which launches on 15 April.Creative partners include designer Ron Arad, artist Lucy McRae, musicians Beatie Wolfe and Rosey Chan, and trend forecaster Li Edelkoort, who will be creating content for the festival. Other partners include Lisbon's MAAT museum, Serpentine Galleries, What Design Can Do, London Festival of Architecture, Forward Festival, The Artling, Vienna Design Week, Stockholm Furniture & Light Fair and Stockholm Design Week, San Francisco Design Week, Sight Unseen, Pecha Kucha and architecture photography festival Zoomed In.
Conceived as the world's first online architecture and design festival, Virtual Design Festival will run from 15 April until 30 June and include contributions from designers, festivals, institutions and brands around the world.Curator Beatrice Galilee of New York architecture conference The World Around will curate a full day of interviews, essays and videos for Earth Day on 22 April.
Ron Arad will present a digital version of an exhibition celebrating the 90th anniversary of Mickey Mouse that was due to be held at OTI gallery in Los Angeles, but which has been cancelled due to coronavirus. Arad described VDF as "a great initiative to bring us all together at this extraordinary time".
Musicians Beatie Wolfe and Rosey Chan will contribute live interviews and performances. Terreform One co-president Mitchell Joachim will launch his new book. Architecture photographer Edmund Sumner will stream an exclusive series of movies featuring the work of Indian architects that he filmed in India earlier this year. In addition, as part of the festival, Dezeen will conduct a daily video interview with leading creatives around the world.
We will also premiere a series of exclusive video interviews with fashion designer Iris van Herpen, plus another series about influential architecture collective Archigram featuring exclusive interviews with Archigram co-founders Peter Cook and Dennis Crompton. Media partners include Observer Design, The Guardian and Dirty Furniture.All Virtual Design Festival content will be free to all readers everywhere, with no registration required.
Virtual Design Festival (Dezeen), Global - Exhibition
Dezeen dedicated a full day to the work of Beatie Wolfe for its virtual design festival. This included an interview with Dezeen’s editor Marcus Fairs, a Q&A, live performance and hosting the Barbican documentary about Beatie Wolfe’s work.
2020 APR: Virtual Design Festival (Dezeen), Global
Talk + Essay + Performance + Exhibition / Beatie Wolfe
Dezeen dedicated a full day to the work of Beatie Wolfe for its virtual design festival. This included an interview with Dezeen’s editor Marcus Fairs, a Q&A, live performance and hosting the Barbican documentary about Beatie Wolfe’s work.
Dezeen on Beatie Wolfe's Raw Space Album Deck
Beatie Wolfe's "intelligent" Raw Space album reveals itself as a deck of cards
Musician Beatie Wolfe has uploaded her latest album onto a pack of cards that listeners tap on a phone to play each song.
Each card in the eight-track "album deck" is embedded with a near field communication (NFC) chip that allows listeners to access a song per card when tapped against a device, using technology similar to a city travel card or Apple Pay.
Scanning the card using a NFC-reader app reveals an individual page for the track, which is complete with lyrics, the music video, photos, song notes and information about the card itself.
The content on each card is updated periodically to give the "intelligent" album – called Raw Space – a "living" or "dynamic" quality.
The London-based musician wanted to "reimagine the vinyl experience for the digital age" by adding a tangible element to the listening experience.
"I fell in love with albums as a kid and saw opening up a physical record as a tangible gateway into the world of the album," Wolfe told Dezeen.
"I like that it brings back the tangibility, the story, the artwork and a sense of ceremony to the experience of listening to a record," she explained.
"But at the same time it presents a new way to experience music, so that it feels different and magical. In this sense, it encourages you to go deep and sit down with an album as an art form again," she continued.
Wolfe worked together with eight international designers to make unique graphics for each of the eight cards based on a black and gold foil colour-scheme – a reference to a gold mylar-wrapped space chamber installation she created for the Victoria and Albert Museum last year.
Erik Spiekermann, Marian Bantjes, Astrid Stavro, Lucienne Roberts, Rafael Prieto, Sean Adams, Yuma Naito and design studio Atlas were tasked with creating graphicsfor each card based on their visual response to an assigned song.
"With the gold mylar being a key feature, the idea was then to have each song card freely designed by eight leading international designers to reflect their own visual response to the music. I didn't want to lead this aspect but have it be their own interpretation," said Wolfe.
According to the musician, it is the first time gold foil has been incorporated into a NFC card.
Many designers are embarking on projects exploring the relationship between music and technology.
Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design graduate Liron Gino designed a set of jewellery-like devices that allow deaf and hard-of-hearing people to experience music through vibration.