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Barbican’s Unravel exhibition explores the subversive power of textiles
CategoriesInterior Design

Barbican’s Unravel exhibition explores the subversive power of textiles

By Zarkon Group,

Curator Lotte Johnson discusses the transformative power of textiles in this video produced by Dezeen for the Barbican’s latest exhibition.

Titled Unravel: The Power and Politics of Textiles in Art, the exhibition examines how textiles have been employed to explore themes spanning power, oppression, gender and belonging.

It features over 100 works that make use of textile, fibre and thread from over 50 artists from across the globe, spanning from the 1960s to the present day.

The exhibition explores how artists have used textiles to express their lived experience

The exhibition is designed to challenge the perception of textiles being solely domestic or craft practices and instead features textile works that relate a story of resistance and rebellion as well as pieces that present narratives of emancipation and joy.

Johnson explained that textiles offer a meaningful medium to express personal and political issues due to their tactile nature and intimate connection to daily life.

“Textiles are one of the most under-examined mediums in art history and in fact history itself,” Johnson said. “They are an intrinsic part of our everyday lives. When we’re born, we’re shrouded in a piece of fabric. Everyday we wrap ourselves in textiles,” she continued.

“They’re really this very intimate, tactile part of our lives and therefore perhaps the most intrinsic, meaningful way to express ourselves.”

Judy Chicago Birth ProjectJudy Chicago Birth Project
Feminist artist Judy Chicago’s Birth Project depicts birth as a mystical and confrontational process

The exhibition is structured into six thematic sections. The first, called Subversive Stitch, presents works that challenge binary conceptions of gender and sexuality.

The section includes feminist artist Judy Chicago’s Birth Project, which vividly depicts the glory, pain and mysticism of giving birth, as well as a piece from South African artist Nicholas Hlobo, which, despite initially appearing as a painting, is made using ribbon and leather stitched into a canvas.

Another section of the exhibition is titled Bearing Witness, which brings together artists who employ textiles to confront and protest political injustices and systems of violent oppression.

Teresea Margolles tapestry Teresea Margolles tapestry
Artist Teresa Margolles creates collective tapestries that trigger conversations on police brutality

Included in this section are tapestries by Mexican artist Teresa Margolles that commemorate the lives of individuals including Eric Garner and Jadeth Rosano López.

Garner was an African-American man killed in 2014 by NYPD police officer Daniel Pantaleo, who put Garner into a chokehold during arrest. López was a seventeen-year old-girl assassinated in Panama City.

Margolles used fabric that had been placed in contact with the victims’ deceased bodies and collaborated with embroiderers from their respective local communities to create the tapestries.

The Wound and Repair sections includes work from American artist and activist Harmony Hammond’s Bandaged Grid series, in which layered fabric is used to evoke imagery reminiscent of an injured body.

Tau Lewis tapestryTau Lewis tapestry
Tau Lewis’ fabric assemblages offer new narratives of black histories

While violence and brutality are key themes examined in the exhibition, it also showcases how textiles can be used to create narratives of hope. The final, most expansive section of the exhibition is titled Ancestral Threads, which encompasses works created to inspire a sense of optimism and reconnect with ancestral practices.

“This section not only explores artists processing exploitative and violent colonial and imperialist histories, but also celebrates the artists who are re-summoning and relearning ancient knowledge systems to imagine a different kind of future,” Johnson explained.

Canadian multimedia artist Tau Lewis’s work titled The Coral Reef Preservation Society is a patchwork assemblage of recycled fabrics and seashells including fragments of textured denim.

The work pays homage to the enslaved women and children thrown overboard in the Middle Passage, the historical transportation route used during the Atlantic slave trade. These women and children have been reimagined as underwater sea creatures to transform the narrative into one of regeneration.

Vicuña revives the art of the quipu in her installation Quipu Austral

A large installation by Chilean artist Cecilia Vicuña titled Quipu Austral is situated towards the end of the exhibition. The installation takes the form of billowing ribbons hanging from the ceiling.

Vicuña references quipu, a form of recording used by a number cultures in Andean South America. Quipu was a ancient writing system which used knotted textile cords to communicate information.

Other sections in the exhibition include Fabric of Everyday, which explores the daily uses of textiles, as well as Borderlands, which examines how textiles have been used to challenge ideas around belonging.

These sections feature works such as Shelia Hicks’ colourful woven bundles and Margarita Cabrera’s soft sculpture cacti crafted from reclaimed US border patrol uniforms.

Mexican-American artist Margarita Cabrera uses reclaimed border patrol uniforms in her work

“We hope that people might come out of this exhibition feeling invigorated and moved by the stories of resilience and rebellion embedded in the work but also hope and emancipation,” Johnson said.

“I hope that the show might inspire people to pick up a needle and thread themselves and use it to express their own lived experience.”

The show is a partnership between the Barbican and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and was co-curated by Barbican curators Johnson, Wells Fray-Smith and Diego Chocano, in collaboration with Amanda Pinatih from the Stedelijk.

Unravel: The Power and Politics of Textiles in Art is at the Barbican Centre until 26 May 2024. See Dezeen Events Guide for an up-to-date list of architecture and design events taking place around the world.

Partnership content

This video was produced by Dezeen for the Barbican Centre as part of a partnership. Find out more about Dezeen’s partnership content here.

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Harvesting solar power via see-through windows 
CategoriesSustainable News

Harvesting solar power via see-through windows 

By Zarkon Group,

Spotted: Analysts think that 2030 global renewable energy capacity goals are reachable, with the caveat that much still needs to be done, particularly as the volume of power needed by the rapidly growing number of data centres is unknown. California greentech company Ubiquitous Energy’s solution is to make it possible to generate power via a patented transparent solar coating, called UE Power, which could turn almost any window into a solar panel.

The coating is made from naturally occurring sustainable materials, with no toxic ingredients, that capture the energy from ultraviolet and infrared light. The light that is visible to the human eye, meanwhile, passes through the coating just as it does with a standard, uncoated window. The transparency of the coating means that any surface, from high-rise commercial buildings to car windshields and personal device screens can generate solar electricity without interfering with the look and functionality of the original material.

An average-sized window of three feet by five feet, coated in the UE Power glazing, offsets up to 200 watt-hours of electricity per day, which is equivalent to charging a smartphone 13 times daily. What is more, the coating offsets up to 30 per cent of the building’s electricity use, and for residential homes and certain commercial locations, solar-powered windows can provide a direct charge to smaller devices such as security cameras and motorised blinds – without requiring connection to the grid.

Right now, the glazing is available on new or replacement windows only, and Ubiquitous Energy works with a number of leading glass and window manufacturers to make the technology as accessible as possible. The company plans to make retrofitting of older windows available in the future.  

As demand for renewables increases, so too does the versatility of its applications, with innovations spotted in Springwise’s library including floating solar panels and flexible versions for rooftops unable to hold the weight of traditional arrays.   

Written By: Keely Khoury

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Harnessing power through existing ocean infrastructure
CategoriesSustainable News

Harnessing power through existing ocean infrastructure

By Zarkon Group,

Spotted: Depending on what source you use, the total estimated output of global wave energy is somewhere between 20 and 90,000 terawatt-hours per year. Although this is a wide range, when you consider that the total global energy consumption is now over 25,000 terawatt-hours per year, even the low end of the range is enough to cover most of humanity’s energy needs. The main issue, however, is finding the best way to take advantage of this wave energy.

Moroccan startup Advanced Third Age Renewable Energies Company (ATAREC) is developing a system to exploit the wave energy close to shore, in the areas around breakwaters and other infrastructure exposed to the sea. The startup’s Wave Beat technology captures energy from the vertical variations in sea level using a free-floating buoy.

ATAREC has constructed a demonstrator in the Port of Tanger-Med, 45 kilometres north of Tangier, to take advantage of the 110 megawatts of wave energy in front of the port’s vertical breakwater. The energy produced by the Wave Beat is used directly at the huge port to help run operations.

The company has received more than €900,000 in funding, including equity, grants, and non-dilutive funding. ATAREC is currently applying for additional funding and plans to launch a fundraising campaign.

Wave energy is starting to take off, with other innovations spotted by Springwise including a design for generating energy from the movement of ships in the water and rolling wave generators to power sensors.

Written By: Lisa Magloff

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Elevating wind power with spiral welding technology
CategoriesSustainable News

Elevating wind power with spiral welding technology

By Zarkon Group,

Spotted: To reach net zero by 2050, we need to drastically reduce our reliance on fossil fuels, and that means ramping up green energy generation. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), that involves adding 390 gigawatts of wind power generation capacity every year by 2030. But, rising upfront construction costs, particularly for offshore farms, could compromise that goal, with several offshore projects in the US needing to be cancelled or renegotiated due to issues around financing. Hoping to make wind farm construction more affordable is Colorado-based Keystone Tower Systems. 

The company has devised a revolutionary manufacturing process that streamlines and cuts the cost of making turbine columns. In the company’s spiral welding process, which is a well-established technique used to create pipelines, large pieces of steel are fed into a machine, so they curve around into a spiral shape to form a turbine base. The process can be done quickly and continuously by one machine that completes the joining, rolling, fit-up, welding, and severing of a tower section. 

With this method, it’s easy to vary the diameters and wall thicknesses, which means that wind towers can be built twice as tall as existing structures, enabling turbines with bigger blades that can also reach greater wind speeds further up in the sky. This means greater wind energy generation.  

Keystone’s manufacturing facilities have a relatively small footprint, meaning they can be placed near proposed wind farms for on-site production. Developers therefore don’t need to worry about making long, expensive, and energy-intensive journeys to transport the massive pre-manufactured components required for larger-scale turbines. Instead, steel can be shipped flat, making for much easier transportation. This is particularly helpful for offshore farms, as a temporary manufacturing facility can be easily deployed on the coast, for the creation of tall, structurally optimised towers. 

Wind is playing a key role in the green transition, and innovators are working to make it more efficient than ever. Springwise has also spotted small turbines for wind microgrids as well as this novel design that cuts the cost of wind power.

Written By: Archie Cox and Matilda Cox

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Solar cycle paths: a bright idea for power generation
CategoriesSustainable News

Solar cycle paths: a bright idea for power generation

By Zarkon Group,

Spotted: In its first meeting, the UK’s Solar Taskforce highlighted the “untapped potential of commercial sites for solar.” What many commercial sites have in common is their provision of walkways and carparks for public use. Those areas, fitted into the space that is available, could be valuable producers of renewable energy, as demonstrated by an innovation created by French infrastructure construction company the Colas Group and INES, the French National Institute of Solar Energy. 

The organisations created a subsidiary, Wattway, to market a solar energy system that can be walked, biked, and driven on. Called the Wattway Pack, the turnkey system provides solar panels, an electrical storage cabinet, and a connection to a device needing power. 

The photovoltaic road surface requires nothing more than glue to attach it to paved areas, and the surface of the panels is treated with a solution to provide the same grip as a regular road. The Wattway Pack is modular and scalable, with PV panels available in packs of 3, 6, 9, and 12, and produces power ranging from 375 to 1,500 watts depending on the number of panels in use.   

In December, a new Wattway project was announced, in collaboration with Dutch construction company Royal BAM Group. There are over 35,000 kilometres of cycle paths across the Netherlands. The two companies hope to take advantage of that, and commissioned two cycle lanes, each 1,000 metres squared, across the North Brabant and North Holland provinces in the Netherlands. The goal is for the paths to generate at least 160 megawatt-hours of electricity for the Dutch grid in the first year, and the project will be overseen for the next five years. 

From solar-powered public transport vehicles to off-grid solar systems for disaster relief, Springwise’s library highlights a range of ways in which innovators are scaling down the size of renewable energy systems in order to scale up overall use and electricity production.

Written By: Keely Khoury

Reference

A novel design cuts the cost of wind power
CategoriesSustainable News

A novel design cuts the cost of wind power

By Zarkon Group,

Spotted: The cost of onshore wind energy has fallen steadily over the last decade. However, wind installations have also steadily increased in size, and while bigger turbines generate more energy, they also make it more difficult to secure public approval and find financing, appropriate sites, and materials. Wind company AirLoom is taking a new approach to address these challenges.

Instead of huge blades on tall towers, AirLoom’s design consists of vertically oriented, 10-metre-long wings attached to a lightweight track. The blades intercept the wind, which propels them down the track, generating power. Supported by 25-metre-tall poles arranged in an oval, the track can range in length from metres to miles, depending on the desired scale.

A key advantage of the design is that it is quieter and lower profile than skyline-dominating turbines, which could help to reduce complaints about local disruption and ruined views. The system is also low-cost and modular, which means it can be deployed at different scales using a standard set of components.

AirLoom recently announced that it has secured $4 million (around €3.7 million) in seed funding. The round was led by Breakthrough Energy Ventures fund, which supports new clean technologies, with participation from Lowercarbon Capital and energy fund MCJ Collective. The money will help AirLoom scale up to the megawatt scale and full deployment.

Despite the difficult market for new wind energy projects, a number of innovations seek to make wind power more affordable. These include a low-cost, single-bladed floating turbine and small turbines for powering microgrids.

Written By: Lisa Magloff and Matthew Hempstead

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Plucking power from poultry with feather fuel cells
CategoriesSustainable News

Plucking power from poultry with feather fuel cells

By Zarkon Group,

Spotted: Fuel cells come in many different forms, but at the heart of all of them is a semi-permeable membrane. These are made out of “forever chemicals”, which are both environmentally hazardous and toxic to humans. Now, researchers from NTU Singapore and ETH Zürich believe they have found a way to replace these harmful chemicals in fuel cells with chicken feathers. 

The waste feathers, which would have been discarded anyway, are made out of a protein called keratin. Once extracted, this keratin can be heated to create ultra-fine fibres called amyloid fibrils. The researchers found that these fibrils, in turn, could be used to create a membrane that was capable of conducting protons – a crucial aspect of fuel cell membranes.  

Fuel cells can be great providers of clean energy, with hydrogen fuel cells producing only water and electricity when used, rather than generating greenhouse gases like conventional fuels. As well as eliminating the need for harmful substances in the fuel cell, the technology also makes use of a significant waste source and prevents the feathers from being burnt, which produces further CO2. As one of lead researchers, Professor Raffaele Mezzenga, said: “Our latest development closes a cycle: we are taking a substance that releases carbon dioxide and toxic gases when burned and using it in a different setting“.  

In testing, a fuel cell setup using the membrane was capable of powering an LED lamp and spinning a small fan. The team’s next step will be to test the durability of the membrane and make necessary improvements. The researchers have already filed for the associated patent and are looking to partner with investors, with the goal of eventually making the technology commercially available. 

Springwise has spotted other ways innovators are unleashing the potential of clean hydrogen fuel, including in a plane powered by liquid hydrogen as well as a new compact hydrogen fuel cell. 

Written By: Archie Cox

Reference

Harnessing solar power to redesign public transport
CategoriesSustainable News

Harnessing solar power to redesign public transport

By Zarkon Group,

According to the International Energy Agency, 10 per cent of passenger vehicles sold globally in 2022 were all-electric – ten times more than were sold five years ago. In sub-Saharan Africa, where solar energy is abundant, electric vehicles (EVs) represent a pathway to a low-cost, low-emissions transport future – which is not only great news in terms of tackling the climate crisis, but also in terms of improving air quality in many cities. Nairobi in Kenya is the fourth most congested city in the world, and suffers from air pollution that consistently exceeds World Health Organization guidelines. Kenyan electric transport company Roam is building affordable, clean energy vehicles which promise to revolutionise transport in Africa.

To date, mass adoption of EVs in African countries has not been possible because most models are not designed for use in Africa, where the vast majority of travellers rely on various forms of public transport rather than private vehicles. While road conditions are generally good in the Kenyan capital, some remain unsurfaced and so develop potholes. And once you are out of the city centre, less than six per cent of roads in Kenya are tarmacked. To overcome this challenge, Kenyan electric mobility company Roam Electric has designed a range of specifically adapted e-motorbikes and buses suitable for African terrain.

The bikes are an affordable and efficient solution for Nairobi’s Boda Boda taxi drivers, who give commuters lifts on motorbikes. The Roam bikes can cut the drivers’ costs by 50 per cent and are more attractive to customers as they offer a smoother ride. For the 43 per cent of Nairobians who use public transport, the ‘Roam Move’ and ‘Roam Rapid’ electric buses have helped to create a more integrated public transport system that can bring people in from more rural areas.

Like other cities around the world, Nairobi is growing fast, and around 200,000 fossil-fuelled vehicles are added to its roads each year. Roam Electric promises a viable alternative, tailored to suit the specific needs of the city’s landscape and people; a model that can be developed and adapted across Sub-Saharan Africa.

Video and article credit: RE:TV

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Heating commercial real estate with geothermal power
CategoriesSustainable News

Heating commercial real estate with geothermal power

By Zarkon Group,

Spotted: Geothermal energy is one of the most energy-efficient methods for providing HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) for businesses and communities alike. But the problem that has traditionally faced geothermal power is the high upfront cost of establishing boreholes to tap into this energy in the ground, especially in contrast to other readily available energy infrastructure. And for tall commercial properties or apartment blocks, traditional geothermal systems have also not been able to provide enough energy to heat or power the entire building. This is where US startup Bedrock Energy comes in. 

The company has developed new autonomous drilling and subsurface modelling technology that allows borefield construction to be around three times quicker and cheaper. Crucially, unlike existing boreholes, which are often drilled 300 to 800 feet below the Earth’s surface, Bedrock drills 2,000 feet underground where the temperatures are much hotter. 

Because of this, the company reduces the number of boreholes required for a project – from as much as 28 down to just eight – meaning tall commercial buildings with limited land space can still make use of this abundant energy source for their heating and cooling systems.  

Using its advanced algorithms, Bedrock can accurately predict the energy transfer to buildings from the geothermal site. The company then specially designs a project’s geothermal loop field to optimise borehole location for the best long-term energy returns.  

Bedrock is ready to start deploying to commercial projects soon and is currently working on a pilot project. The company recently raised $8.5 million (around €7.9 million) in seed funding, which will be used to help accelerate the manufacturing and deployment of its technology. 

Many more innovators are recognising the potential of geothermal energy, and Springwise has also spotted one company that’s using Kenya’s geothermal resources to power direct air capture as well as a system that makes geothermal less water-intensive.

Written By: Archie Cox

Reference

Robot-made tunnels could reshape the power grid
CategoriesSustainable News

Robot-made tunnels could reshape the power grid

By Zarkon Group,

Spotted: The US has a huge problem with its utilities. The country’s current grid is both outdated and overloaded. And the transition to renewable energy is exacerbating this problem, as increasing electrification – driven, in particular, by the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) – creates a greater demand for power. At the same time, increasingly frequent extreme weather conditions are straining the grid beyond its ability to function. According to startup EarthGrid, tunnels are the solution to these problems.

Normally, utility tunnels are time-consuming and expensive to construct. But, EarthGrid has developed a way to bore tunnels exponentially faster and at a fraction of the cost of conventional techniques. The company’s Plasma Trenching System uses a plasma robot powered by renewable energy to trench in hard rock at speeds of up to 600 meters per day.

EarthGrid uses its plasma torches to bore underground supergrids that can be used to transmit renewable energy as well as ultra-high-speed internet, clean water pipes, and even delivery services.

The company offers two services. Its Build, Own, Operate & Maintain (B.O.O.M.) service offers a long-term lease covering the commodities flowing through the EarthGrid tunnels. Meanwhile, Boring and Drilling as a Simple Service (B.A.D.A.S.S.), is designed for customers who want to own their own tunnels.

EarthGrid has been granted Utility Status and Certificates of Public Convenience and Necessity in 34 States. A recent seed round was massively oversubscribed, raising $30 million (around €28 million), bringing the total equity to approximately $50 million raised since inception in 2016 (around €47 million).

Transporting renewable energy is becoming a big limiting factor for new projects. Luckily, a number of innovations are seeking to tackle this, and Springwise has spotted the use of modular fuel packs to transport energy and the development of thermal energy storage systems.

Written By: Lisa Magloff

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