Archives: Projects

Catenary stainless steel ball chains descent dramatically from a suspended elliptical ring beam and then return skyward on a new path forming two shells of pattern and color. We produced a translucent three-dimensional painting, fabricated with a custom digital cutting machine. Depending on the viewer’s vantage point, the 1141 multi-colored chains of Euphony may appear as a hard-edged geometric form or blur to a vapor-like visual composition.

Materials: stainless steel ball chain, steel tube, baked enamel finish

Total weight of the artwork (2,100 lbs. ) and ring beam (1,400 lbs.) is 3,500 lbs.

Euphony amplifies aesthetics of light, reflection and color creating a visual spectacle and physical sensation in a public space. 25 miles of stainless steel chain are attached to a 30’ x 8’  steel ring beam that is suspended 3’ from ceiling. Euphony hangs 106’ and 10’ 11” above first level floor.
Principals in Charge: Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues

Project Manager: James Jones

Project Team: Caroline Duncan, Richy Garcia, Emma Helgerson, Christine-Forster Jones, Allison Myers, Mora Nabi, Adam Parkhurst, Bhumi Patel, Allison Porterfield, Marissa Ritchen

Custom Software Design: www.sparcestudio.com

Structural Engineer: Buro Happold, Los Angeles. Frank Reppi lead engineer.

Using standard sheets of paper as our raw material, we made a pulp slurry in a blender. We then added colorant to the slurry to develop a palette. The colored pulp was molded into face-like forms using a pre-cut platen shaped like a head. The shapes were ironed to dry. The result might be understood as a crazy mask that the kids (and kids at heart) took home.

From the Hammer’s Event Text:

On May 5th, 2013 the Hammer Museum hosted its fourth annual K.A.M.P. (Kids’ Art Museum Project), an event imagined by artists for children of all ages. Painters, sculptors, architects, and creative types of all kinds lead inventive hands-on workshops in the carefree atmosphere of the Hammer Museum courtyard. All K.A.M.P. proceeds support the Museum¹s growing Hammer Kids public programming.

Unlike other family events, K.A.M.P. provided extraordinary access and experiences for kids and their families with renowned Los Angeles artists, many of whom have been the subject of exhibitions at the Hammer Museum or are represented in the Hammer Contemporary Art Collection. This year’s participating artists were: Edgar Arceneaux, Benjamin Ball & Gaston Nogues, Cayetano Ferrer, Mark Hagen, Pearl Hsiung, Vishal Jugdeo, Glenn Kaino, T. Kelly Mason, Rita McBride & Glen Rubsamen, Ruben Ochoa, Monique Prieto & Michael Webster, Retna, Fatima Robinson, Ry Rocklen, Anila Rubiku, Brian Sharp, Adam Silverman, John Sonsini, Jennifer Steinkamp, and Oscar Tuazon.    

K.A.M.P. also celebrated reading with Story Time in the Permanent Collection galleries. Celebrity guests engaged families as they read from their favorite children’s books and share exciting stories. Book readings for this year were presented by Dianna Agron, James Van Der Beek, Julie Bowen, and Jodie Foster. K.A.M.P. is a chance for the Hammer’s cultural patrons to share their love of contemporary art with their children.

For the Music Legs Glob Lamp we adapted materials and processes commonly used in the mass production of packaging to yield a series of lamps. Each lamp is a unique sculptural object. Paper pulp forms an integrated structure and skin, such that the only non-biodegradable components are the bulb housing and cord. A variant of our earlier Glob Lamp 01, which resembles the iconic head of a famous cartoon mouse or an abstraction of male or female anatomy, this series has a wider range of potential shapes. As with the subjective interpretation of clouds, the viewer can read different meanings in the forms of each lamp. Because of the unique fabrication process, no single lamp can be exactly reproduced.

Waterline resembles a thickened atmosphere of ghostly waves within the double high entryway of Building 204. It is neither solid nor emptiness but has qualities of both. Seventeen thousand segments of painted stainless steel ball chain, totaling over 10 miles in length make up this work. By integrating digital computation with hand production techniques, Ball-Nogues meticulously combined the segments to form an array of “catenaries” that span the ceiling. In mathematics, a catenary is the shape of a curve formed by a chain hanging between two points.

Composed of seven colors, the chains make an intricate system of overlapping curves. The result suggests a three-dimensional abstract painting that looks differently depending on one’s vantage point. From one angle, the viewer sees hard-edged geometric shapes in distinct color; from another angle, she sees the same colors blurred to make a vapor-like composition.

In naval engineering, the term “waterline” refers to the contour made by the hull of a ship meeting water. This Ball-Nogues installation includes a field of magenta color that is parallel to the ground plane catenaries. Analogous to a waterline, this feature becomes reference for gauging the discrepancies between the “theoretical” models generated within the computer and the physical reality of the installation constructed from the data output by the computer.

Principals in Charge: Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues

Project Management: Benjamin Jenett

Project Team: James Jones, Allison Porterfield, Anirudh Dhawan, Sonali Patel, Melissah Bridge, Edwin Cho, Julian Rui Hwang, H Clark, Mora Nabi, R.J. Tripodi

Structural Engineering Consultants: Buro Happold, Los Angeles.

Custom Software Design: www.sparcestudio.com

An assemblage of cast paper imprints derived from non-architectural objects, Yevrus 1, Negative Impression is a disposable architecture of literal references. It calls into question the contemporary architectural vogue for software generated form, complexity and abstraction. A 1973 Volkswagen Beetle and a late 1970’s open top speedboat were cast multiple times in recycled paper pulp and then united to make a strong structural whole. Visitors to the Gallery can occupy a mock tanning booth formed from the negative spaces left by the artifacts.

With Negative Impression, Ball and Nogues pose the question, “can we adapt everyday objects as tools for fabrication and generators of both architectural space and decoration?”

The project inverts and reworks some of the methods Bruce Nauman employed in making the sculpture A Cast of the Space Under My Chair in1965. Where Nauman makes a solid cast directly from a negative space found in the real world, Ball-Nogues makes a negative cast directly from a solid object and then expands the process to yield an architectural system of panels that can be arranged according to functional demands and aesthetic whimsy.

Prior to selecting the Beetle and speedboat, the designers considered several iconic relics gleaned from the Los Angeles suburban-scape including a 19-foot tall roadside “Muffler Man” and a classic kidney bean swimming pool. To study each objects feasibility for use in the project, the team explored the structural possibilities of its form, evaluated its potential to become a heated mold, and then tested a proprietary pulp casting process on it. Once chosen, the object was then digitally scanned in three dimensions. The scan data provided an accurate model of the object that reflected its idiosyncrasies in minute detail. The data was then used for studying the arrangement of spaces and determining how each shape might be divided into panels and unified within the structural whole.

The designers call this integrated design and production process “Yevrus”—the word “Survey” spelled backwards. In this project, the first in a series of Yevrus experiments; Ball-Nogues rethink conventional uses for scanning and surveying equipment and explore its potential within architectural design methodologies. No longer a simple tool for construction and engineering, the survey is a means for “finding” form, seeking structural stability, and realizing iconic meaning.

Long considered disposable, paper has traditionally played only a supporting roll for architecture. As a medium for drawings, models, and memos, it assists in the process of design. Origami notwithstanding, designers have recently begun to recognize paper’s potential for three-dimensional products and architectural building systems. Paper is also potentially more sustainable than other materials because it is made from a renewable resource making it well suited for provisional structures.

Ball-Nogues Studio: Benjamin Ball, Gaston Nogues, Benjamin Jenett, Allison Porterfield, Anirudh Dhawan, Melissah Bridge, Mora Nabi, Edwin Cho

Project Manager: James Jones

SCI-Arc Student Workshop Team: Sonali Patel, H Clark, Julian Rui Huang, Roger Cortes, Edwin Nourian, Vanessa Teng, Manori Sumanasignhe, Chung Ming Lam, Chi Hang Lo, Casey Benito, Duygun Inal, Hector Campagna, Cristen Dawson, Gyoung Min Ko, Jonathan Schnure, Francisco Movre, Pablo Osorio, Amir Hababiolaolalai

Other contributors: Forester Rudolf, Kristen Loheed

Digital Scans and Consulting: ScanLAB Projects

Structural Consultants: Buro Happold, Los Angeles.

Special thanks to Eric Kim for letting us use his pool.

The Pavillon Spéciale is an installation designed and built by students of the Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture under the direction of Ball-Nogues Studio. The installation can be arched and curled at full scale to form different types of space befitting the university’s summer program. The installation creates a sense of place while providing a respite from the sun and rain.

The pavilion is a unique structure. In architecture terminology, the phrase that describes a system whose form is derived from the deformation of its materials under force is “form active.” This type of structure is difficult to study using software. It often requires architects to explore their designs by testing full-scale mock-ups, and using that empirical information to help inform the process of digital modeling, which is studied in the studio rather than in the field. Students engaged in this iterative design process with Ball-Nogues.

The structure is comprised of approximately 200 “cells”, each made from locally sourced plastic tubing bent and curled in custom jigs designed and constructed by students.  To provide shade, each cell has locally sourced fabric membrane spanning between the tubes. The cell module is a very effective way of constructing a temporary structure: each can be transported as a flat unit and rapidly assembled on site; when it is time for the structure to come down, dismantling and transportation to a new site is easy.

project info:

Description of the competion:

The Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture enters its 2^nd edition of the “Pavillon Spéciale”, an annual spring architectural series that gives young emerging architects the opportunity to build with students, a temporary project in the heart of Paris. Once a year from June to October, The Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture will become an international theatre for architectural experimentation, making it unique in its kind. The timescale (maximum of 3 months from invitation to completion) will provide a unique model that presents a strong synergy between architecture and education and with talks before during and after construction, it will become a contemporary platform for architects, students and the city itself.

The “Pavillon Spéciale” program is curated by Matteo Cainer. Conceived by the later in the summer of 2010, it is an ongoing programme of temporary structures by emerging international architects. The series is unique worldwide because it not only presents the work of an international architect or design team, but is an on site collaboration with a team of students from the Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture. Each year a different pavilion will be sited on the school’s inner courtyard, and for five months there will be a programme of public talks, events, performances that will take place in and around the Pavilion.

Talus Dome is both a sculpture in the landscape and a mirror to the landscape.  It reflects the sky, the weather and the river of cars that pass by.   The hollowed dome is part of a holistic landscape where nature and culture are inextricably linked; a unity that belies our dualistic distinctions. The overall shape was developed from our investigation into the geological engineering concept – “angle of repose”, the natural inclination that an aggregated material assumes when dropped into a pile from one point.  In making a shape determined by natural phenomena, we aim to further blur the distinction between the notions of objective, naturally occurring reality and that reality which is culturally constructed through subjective experience.
Talus Dome is an earthwork fashioned from a non-earth work material; an aggregation of steel spheres. It might be perceived as a fragment of synthetic nature that emerges from the ground or a remnant of the process of constructing the bridge itself. Comprised of approximately 900 stainless steel spheres that together assume the shape of an abstracted pile or mound, it is void in the center rather than solid.  It also has spaces and gaps between the spheres, leaving the viewer to complete the shape with her mind’s eye while enabling her to see between the spheres and through the pile. The surrounding landscape is reflected within each of the spheres.  This duality contributes to the playful quality of the work.  In one way, the work becomes part of the environment through mimicry and reflection, however, in the same spatial gesture, the work is artifice by way of its transparency and the empty cavity within it.
Talus Dome embodies nature in two ways.  One, because its shape quite literally suggests natural features in the landscape of the Edmonton region such talus cones below river bluffs, piles of gravel on construction sites, snow drifts, etc. Two, because, in engineering terms, the domed form is a parabolic shell structure where each individual sphere settles into a gravity induced, self-organized relationship to its neighbors.  We also employed a “form finding” methodology to determine the overall shape of the dome. This process is akin to the one employed by architect Antonio Gaudi for his Sagrada Familia in Barcelona to yield shapes that have an optimal level of structural stability but use minimal amounts of material. The dome is structurally sound by virtue of its geometry rather than the mass of its materials; it is highly efficient.

Conversely, the surface of Talus Dome takes on different colors with the changing seasons and hours of the day as it literally reflects its surroundings. Under certain lighting conditions, it has a strong visual presence along the Drive, and at others, it visually recedes to blend into the scenery.  Its visual quality is not static, and it therefore creates an appealing tension between the permanence that it exhibits and aims to symbolize, and its changeable appearance that suggests the mutability of nature.

Talus Dome commemorates the unique beauty of Edmonton and the surrounding region while reminding us of man’s agency within it. We aim to call to mind the breathtaking vistas along the North Saskatchewan River while creating a landmark for bicyclists, pedestrians and motorists.  Unlike the mistake that was made by the City of Los Angeles when it paved over the Los Angeles River in the early 20th Century, Edmonton has woven the Alberta landscape through the city itself in the form of the River; it has allowed the River and its flood plains to remain pristine and idyllic while the City develops.  Talus Dome is an evocative emblem of this actuality and a celebration of the coexistence of human kind with the natural landscape along Whitemud Drive – a river of another kind.

Principals and Designers in Charge: Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues

Project Manager: James Jones

Project Team: Karla Castillo, Deborah Chang, Tyler Crain, Constantina Dendramis, Jessica DeVries, Isabel Francoy Albert, Julieta Gil, Benjamin Jenett, James Jones, Ayodh Kamath, Alison Kung, Luciana Martinez, Nicolas Pappas, Allison Porterfield, Samantha Rose, Ron Shvartsman, Caroline Smith, Alejandra Sotelo, Jess Thomas, Julianne Weiss, Evan Wiskup.

Custom Software Design: www.sparcestudio.com

Structural Engineer: Buro Happold, Los Angeles

Located in the barren desert near Joshua Tree National Park, 15 miles from the nearest human settlement, Yucca Crater is a synthetic earthwork that doubled as a recreational amenity during High Desert Test Sites on October 15 & 16, 2011. High Desert Test Sites generates physical and conceptual spaces for art exploring the intersections between contemporary art and life at large. After the event, Yucca Crater was abandoned to the entropic forces of the landscape.

The work resembles a basin that stands 30 feet from rim to low point and is depressed 10 feet into the earth. Rock climbing holds mounted on the interior allow visitors to descend into a deep pool of salt water.

Yucca Crater expands on concepts borrowed from land art, incorporating the prospect of the abandoned suburban swimming pools and ramshackle homestead dwellings scattered across the Mojave. Ball Nogues have re-imagined these interventions in the landscape through a method of production where the tools of fabrication transform to be become objects for display in their own right. The rough plywood structure of Yucca Crater was originally the formwork used to construct another Ball-Nogues work, Talus Dome, in which more than 900 boulder-sized polished metal spheres were assembled to appear as a monumental pile of gravel. The two projects were “cross-designed” such that the method of production used in the first (Talus Dome) has become the central aesthetic for the second (Yucca Crater).

This approach integrates concept, aesthetics, a social event and production, inviting viewers to reconsider their relationship to art by-products while repositioning them within an alternative economic and geographic domain.

This project was made possible with the support of United States Artists Projects.

Designers and Principals in Charge: Benjamin Ball and Gaston Nogues

Project Manager: Benjamin Jenett

Project Team (in alphabetical order): Karla Castillo, Deborah Chang, Tyler Crain, Constantina Dendramis, Jessica DeVries, Julieta Gil, James Jones, Isabel Francoy Albert, Luciana Martinez, Nicolas Pappas, Allison Porterfield, Samantha Rose, Ron Shvartsman, Caroline Smith, Alejandra Sotelo, Jess Thomas, Julianne Weiss, Evan Wiskup.

Structural Engineer: Buro Happold, Los Angeles.

Screen blends imagery of the human hand with production techniques borrowed from glass jewelry making.

The “catenary” is a basic form in nature: a chain suspended from two points will always make this shape. Long necklaces are catenaries. Screen, which is directly behind the storefront glass, is like hundreds of chain necklaces with individual links made of hand profiles made with colored translucent plastic. The chains continually transform the color of sunlight coming into the Teen Center. The work provides privacy for people within the Center from the busy sidewalk while allowing views of the street from within. Hundreds of different hand shapes link together to make up the chains: sometimes the hands have an open palm, sometimes the fingers are stretched outward, sometimes the fingers curl as if to gently hold an object, sometimes the hands grasp.  Combining the logic of animation with sculpture, the shape of each individual hand is derived from video footage. Arrayed in sequences, the hands produce the impression of human gestures.

Lead Artists and Designers: Benjamin Ball, Gaston Nogues

Project Management: Jonathan Kitchens, Benjamin Jenett

Project Team: Julieta Gil, James Jones, Ayodh Kamath, Alison Kung, Luciana Martinez, Allison Porterfield, Rachel Shillander, Caroline Smith, Julianne Weiss, Evan Wiskup

Custom Software Development: www.sparcestudio.com