A Five-Meter Magnifying Glass Uses the Sun’s Immense Power to Melt Metal

“The Solar Metal Smelter.” All images © Jelle Seegers, shared with permission

Anyone who spent time outside with a magnifying glass as a kid is aware of the instrument’s power to generate a staggering amount of heat and even start a fire when hit with sunlight. Designer Jelle Seegers harnesses that practice in a new project he presented as part of the Design Academy Eindhoven student show at this year’s Dutch Design Week.

“The Solar Metal Smelter” uses a square polycarbonate sheet that Seegers carved with circles to mimic the convex lens of a magnifying glass. Extending about five meters wide, the material is embedded in a frame made from upcycled stainless steel, with an attached hand crank that needs to be turned every ten minutes to keep the sun focused on the correct spot. Once heated, the smelter reaches up to 1,000 degrees Celsius and can liquefy zinc, aluminum, and other metals that are then poured into various sand molds. The designer estimates that the device generates about four kilowatts of energy.

In a conversation with Dezeen, Seegers shares that he produced the machine to reduce the reliance on electricity and to better utilize the sun’s power. He says:

Electrical solar panels, they never have an efficiency of more than about 20 percent. Only 20 percent of the sunlight gets converted into electricity, so we need a huge amount of solar panels to create a huge amount of electrical energy. But if you just take the sun’s heat, and you only bend it and direct it, you don’t need to do this complex conversion to electricity. And for that reason, you can achieve an efficiency of about 95 percent.

Seegers plans to scale up the project in the coming months and has been working on a variety of carbon-neutral machines, including the pedal-powered tool grinder shown below. For a similar solar-powered design, check out this sinter that uses sunlight and sand to make glass.

 

The lens of the machine

Seegers shaping the casts for molten metal to be poured into

Seegers using the pedal-powered tool grinder

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Designed for Leisure, Sarah Ross’ ‘Archisuits’ Question the Inhospitable Environments of American Cities

All images © Sarah Ross, shared with permission

Among American cities, Los Angeles has a reputation for being particularly car-centric, and it lacks the infrastructure for walkability or a robust public transit system. This choice of design is inherently political, as it makes commutes and travel across neighborhoods more inaccessible for people who don’t drive.

There’s also the fact that public spaces available to pedestrians generally aren’t constructed with comfort in mind, an issue Chicago-based artist Sarah Ross sought to remedy back in 2005 with the satirical Archisuits. Absurdly shaped, Ross’s four leisurewear pieces bulge with supports that perfectly fit into the negative space of benches, fences, and building facades. The designs draw a contrast between the soft, bendable wearables and the cold, rigid architecture, which the artist describes as “an arm of the law, a form that uses the built environment to police and control raced, classed, and gendered bodies.”

Nearly twenty years later, the project retains its original relevance and has gained new urgency as the climate crisis requires mass reduction in car use and an overhaul in how we collectively conceive of public areas. Ross shares with Colossal:

The same issues are happening where people are criminalized for being poor, black, brown, or disabled in public space. In many places around the globe, there is a turn to the right a monopoly of power is concentrated into the hands of the very few. We continue to live in siloed, segregated worlds.

Find more of the artist’s projects that consider how politics inform spaces on her site.

 

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Dyed and Rolled Pages Splay Outward into Flower-Like Forms in Cara Barer’s Book Sculptures

All images © Cara Barer, shared with permission

Artist Cara Barer curls and rolls the pages of books into sculptures that add colorful dimension to bound tomes. She dyes, shreds, and submerges vintage encyclopedias or instruction manuals in water to distort the typically compact publications. With cracked spins and crinkled pages, the manipulated objects reference the relationship between the natural and human-made as they evoke flowers at peak bloom. For more of Barer’s contorted works, visit her site and Instagram.

 

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The 2022 Landscape Photographer of the Year Contest Captures Stunning Environments Around the U.K.

“The Sacred Garden,” Gray Eaton. All images @ the artists, courtesy of the Landscape Photographer of the Year, shared with permission

From hazy lochs and grand mountainous vistas to water-side pedestrian paths, the 2022 Landscape Photographer of the Year contest highlights the vast splendor of Britain’s environments. Winners of this year’s competition encompass both the natural and human-made, showcasing a steam-engulfed train roaring across the Fellowman Crosses Ribblehead viaduct or a glimmering celestial sky above the limestone arch of Durdle Door.

The contest joins Network Rail for a traveling exhibition that will migrate across the U.K., starting with Paddington Station on October 31. Peruse the winning images on the competition’s site and by picking up a copy of this year’s book.

 

“The Fellsman Crosses Ribblehead Viaduct,” Matthew James Turner

“Durdle Door Night Lights,” Callum White

“Brecon in Winter,” Will Davies, overall winner

“Rough and Tumble,” Lloyd Lane

“Dirgelwch Penmon / Myster,” Llion Griffiths

“Regency Wharf,” Damien Walmsley

“Wild Elgol,” Fiona Campbell

“Ascension,” Demi Oral

“Gannets Overhead,” Thomas Easterbrook

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Vibrant Letters Drift and Twist in Bold Typographic Murals by Pref

“Shake Hands” in Leige, Belgium. All images © Pref, shared with permission

For British artist Pref, the art of decipherment is as integral to his murals as the expressively layered designs. Known for looping and layering blocky text to give the illusion of floating forms, contrasting letters wriggle, tilt, overlap, and cast bold shadows. His training in graphic design spurred an abiding fascination with typography, and while much that field is oriented toward clear communication, Pref is interested in literally twisting messages. He meticulously arranges each letter to form puzzle-like compositions, encouraging the viewer to work out a word or phrase. “The wording for my pieces are usually autobiographical,” he explains, “like clues and relics from my past or a commentary on current times.”

You can see more of Pref’s work on his website and follow updates on Instagram.

 

“Put you in a box” in Liège, Belgium

“Nuture, Nature” in Sand City, California

Left: “You are the one.” Right: “Off and on”

“Remarkable” in Jackson, Michigan

“Here we are” in Los Angeles, California

Left: “Blah blah blah.” Right: “Say bye”

“Drifting” in Ostend, Belgium

“Inspire, Expire” in Bayonne, France

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Papier-Mâché Creatures Inhabit a Whimsical World in Penny Thomson’s Kinetic Sculptures

All images © Penny Thomson, shared with permission

A host of wild creatures inhabit the whimsical world of artist Penny Thomson (previously), who creates intricate, kinetic sculptures that fit in the palm of your hand. Joined in her Derbyshire studio by her daughter Briony, she works primarily with papier-mâché, which she began experimenting with when her children were still young. “Using pulp, laminated and household waste paper, and cardboard, I made a seven-foot giraffe and conducted a workshop in my son’s school, which involved all the pupils in making a 14-foot Diplodocus,” she says.

Since then, Thomson’s creations have scaled down quite a bit, but her interest in working with paper and recycled materials continues. After creating a diorama for illusionist Sam Drake’s House of Magic, she became fascinated with automata and combined skills she acquired over her career to develop the mechanical miniatures. Briony adds, “That is why we say that a batch of two or three kinetic sculptures usually take between one week and 40 years to make!” Each expressive, miniature figure incorporates a mechanism with a small handle that sets it in motion, giving life to hungry chicks, impatient zebras, and joyous penguins.

Thomson regularly releases small batches of sculptures in her Etsy shop. They sell quickly, so you can keep up-to-date about new work on Instagram, and see more on her website.

 

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Ubiquitous Items Are Organized Into Intricate and Colorful Compositions by Adam Hillman

“Skeleton Keys.” All images © Adam Hillman, shared with permission

Everyday objects are puzzled into meticulously organized compositions in the work of Adam Hillman, who has a knack for arranging items like coins, fruits and vegetables, toothpicks, and keys into vibrant flat-lays. Inspired by textures, color, and gradients, the artist responds to the tactile qualities of each material to form intricately woven straws, stacked pennies, and breakfast cereal into geometric forms. You can find more of Hillman’s work on Instagram, and purchase prints at Society6.

 

“Straws-hatching”

“Brick Work”

“Pickwheeling”

“Cubism”

Details of “Straws-hatching” and “Skeleton Keys”

“Balanced Budget”

“Break-Fast”

 

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