The Creativity Paradox: Design

Tuesday, March 15, 2022

Nature is a Grand Material Engineer

Artist, Designer and Engineer, Neri Oxman by Noah Kalina

"Nature is a grand material engineer, we already know that it can generate abalone shells which are twice as strong as our high-tech ceramics and silk that is five times stronger than Steel." Neri Oxman

MIT Media Lab Professor, Neri Oxman, and her students are committed to learning and applying the processes of nature to address the architectural challenges of the modern world. Their studies have included silk worms, bees, and plants to gain understanding in how nature grows structures.

In addition to their structural relevance, the projects Oxman and her team have created are also beautiful works of art. Her work is part of the permanent collections a number of museums in the United States and Europe including the Museum of Modern Art and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

Pnuema 2 by Neri Oxman, Photo by John Cummings

In 2016, the group published a paper on a 3D Printed Multimaterial Microfluid Valve which provides better control in printing using fluid materials including molten glass. While it had been possible before to 3D print with glass by binding glass powder and subsequently sintering the powders, the results were not fully transparent. The MIT process provides structural control and full transparency.

3D Printed Glass by Neri Oxman

5 Reasons You Should Be on Pinterest

If you are involved in any image or graphic centric field, you need to be on Pinterest. Pinterest is a rapidly growing social network where people “pin” their favorite images to virtual boards to share with their friends. When people see an image they particularly like, they can “repin” it to one of their own Pinterest boards. Here are five reasons why you need to join:

1. Entertainment - If you enjoy art, photography or design, what could be more fun or refreshing than spending a few minutes each day looking at the images selected by your friends?

2. Community - Like any social network, Pinterest is a way to find and interact with people who share a common interest in a particular type of imagery. Online interactions strengthen real world connections and often lead to new real world connections.

3. Discovery - New trends in design and photography will be visible on Pinterest long before they are reported in the mainstream press. If you make a point to follow the trendsetters in your field, you will be able to see the evolution in their artistic sensibilities as it happens.

4. Exhibition - The items that you choose to post and repin demonstrate your tastes and skills to your followers. Over time, you will gather a collection of followers who appreciate your unique point of view.

5. Optimization - When you pin images from your own website or blog to a Pinterest board, the image links back to your own site. Those links and the links from every repin will lead people to your site and improve your search engine results.

Your strategy on Pinterest should be, to quote Seth Godin, to be interested and interesting. No different than any other social interaction.

Here is a link to my boards on Pinterest. As you will see, my interests include portraits, places, paintings and photo book ideas.