DMY 2010 award winner: numen/for use

‘tape installation’ at tempelhof airport, berlin image © designboom

in their series of site specific tape installations, croatian design collective numen/for use showcased their latest creation at DMY international design festival berlin 2010. although their tape installations are often conceived as a kind of parasitic object installed into locations such as old attics, columns of a historical building, or an industrial concrete structure, this time a custom scaffolding construction had to be made due to location change by DMY. the result, according to the foruse/numen, translated into a structure reminiscent of a UFO. the installation was executed within four days (approximately 160 working hours) utilizing almost 700 conventional transparent tapes (45 km of tape).

image © designboom

the tendons of multiple layers of transparent adhesive tape were firstly stretched in between the constructions. the following continuous wrapping of tendons resulted in a complex, amorphous surface through a process similar to the growth of organic forms. the idea for the installation originated from a set design concept for a dance performance in which the form evolved from the movement of dancers between the pillars. the dancers stretched the tape while they moved, so the resulting shape became a (tape) recording of their choreography.

the making of ‘tape installation’ at tempelhof airport, berlin

the transport of ‘tape installation’ at tempelhof airport, berlin

image © designboom

detail of tape tendons image © designboom

image © designboom

interior image © designboom

people entered the interior through various cutout ‘doors’

cutout door

the stickiness of the tape allowed objects to be stuck to the walls of the installation image © designboom

image © designboom

tape installation at night

tape installation at night

tape installation at night

aerial view

the wrapping of tape around tape tendons

production process

production process

christoph katzler portrait © designboom