Last year, Dutch kinetic sculptor Theo Jansen visited the University of Iowa, at which he gave a Creative Matters Lecture entitled “Strandbeest- The Dream Machines”. At the outset of this lecture, Jansen, a native of a beach town in Holland, spoke about having initially moved inland to the city of Delft with the purpose of pursuing a degree in physics. Although, after seven years, this purpose seemed futile as Jansen left school, and found a new passion in the 1970s: painting. From here, Jansen eventually began creating out of a workshop, the same workshop from which he continues to work today. Nonetheless, despite the lack of transition in Jansen’s workplace, his interests quickly changed as he spoke of developing newfound passions for robotics…show more content… Furthermore, the use of words such as “genealogy” was a frequent occurrence as Jansen spoke of his sculptures, as well as those created by others like them, with a biological connotation. More specifically, Jansen spoke of how the building of his own sculptures begins in October. Following this, he takes this year’s Beest to the beach in the spring, does experiments over the summer with the sands and storms, and declares the animal “extinct” in the fall as it completes its migration back to childhood beach town where he grew up. From here, the Beest used to go to the “bone yard”, but now goes to expeditions around the world where it, and its ancestors and decedents, may begin movement again on display for the public to…show more content… The skeletal tubing has a core circular movement that enables the Beests to walk on a level plane due to the shape of the curve. The degree of this curvature depends on the lengths of the tubes, which are determined by a computer program simulation. This simulation occurred at the outset of the formulation of Jansen’s work, and was decided upon using the principles of evolution: frequently occurring or similar tube lengths in the simulation’s thousands of outputs must elude to an advantageous correlation between length and success. Furthermore, according to Jansen, the manner in which the Strandbeest moves is based on the proportions of thirteen numbers; he interprets these as the “genetic code” of all Strandbeests. Since being published, this genetic code has been used by thousands for “reproduction” of the Strandbeest; in essence, Jansen said that “they use humanity to multiply”. Nevertheless, since the publication, in the true form of evolution, a man in the Netherlands has developed an alternate, referred to by Jansen as a “mutant”, code that works well, and may be the premise for the next generations. In addition to having a skeleton and wings, the Beest possesses a nervous system. Jansen spoke of how its composition consists of an O-ring at the end of one tube that fits perfectly within another tube, forming pumps that connect to the wings. They pump air, specifically wind, into
