Formlab

Coordinator Elias Heuninck sees the lab as a play space, a place where man and machine can mutually influence each other. A few passages from an interview with Onrust Magazine may clarify the possibilities of the lab:

“When a photographer was a guest recently, he suddenly saw the connection between a classic screen print and the way the 3D printer present allowed resin to stiffen under the impulse of ultraviolet. Such resonances can lead to new practices, according to Heuninck. Another example is the robotic arm. By mounting different heads on the robotic arm, it can serve sometimes as a printer, sometimes as a milling machine. With a camera mounted on it, an automatic tracking shot then becomes possible, and instrument makers could even use it to operate an arc with constant string tension. 3D scanners, 3D printers, a CNC router and a vacuum forming machine are also part of the infrastructure.

Not unimportantly, most machines, like the robotic arm, can be tuned to specific uses. So we can adjust them to our liking. The technological black boxes of the past are therefore promoted to discussion partners in an artistic dialogue. This does sometimes imply a certain learning process. Understanding how the equipment works, on the other hand, can be a source of inspiration. These new forms of data transfer in themselves conjure up a new field of artistic tension: cutting up digital input with arbitrary spaces, crossing different URLs while downloading input data... Cynical sabotage of crypto-luddites or incarnation of prosthetic noise? 'Let’s see what we get' is the motto.”