"The museum-going public is ill served by such imparsable nonsense. Whether one reckons Fuller ludicrously overrated or insufficiently revered, his curious career deserves a better summation than it received at the Whitney."

http://featuresblogs.chicagotribune.com/theskyline/2009/01/from-burnham-to-bucky-mca-bringing-in-whitneys-show-on-creator-of-geodesic-dome.html

Chicago Bucky Show 2009!

Hi Matt,

I stumbled across Fuller's work by serendipity. Does it take much technical know-how to understand Starting with the Universe? Also, if you're thikning of reviving your creativity based on that book, you should check out the Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. Unless the graph paper is enough to un-fetter your muse.

optimism

Here is a Whitney Exhibit presentation to definitely see. This video is an excellent visual and vocal summation of the show. Jaime talks about Bucky in a way everyone can understand.

The PBS 6 minute Whitney video

http://bfi.org/our_programs/who_is_buckminster_fuller/fuller_today/buckminster_fuller_profiled_on_pbss_sundayarts

Hello All,

Apologies if this is in the wrong place, I've just joined and I'm trying to figure out the forum structure.

Side-stepping the 'geometric lego' conversation for a moment, I happened to be at the Whitney last week with my partner and we were delighted with the Buckminster Fuller exhibition.

I fell in love with his work the moment I saw it and it began to ring bells from my childhood.

I bought the book 'Starting With The Universe' and it has re-ignited the love I used to have to geometric shapes and problem solving.

After I've read the book I'm going to buy some graph paper and really let myself go.

I'm looking forward to seeing more inspired work from other free thinkers on this site too, so please do feel free to point out anything you might think of as particularly interesting.

Lovely to have found you all, and if you're wondering what part of MA I'm from, I'm actually in London right now, but I've just returned from Boston, so that felt like the right answer.

Matt / Quit

Best review yet.

Time Out New York / Issue 672 : Aug 13–19, 2008
“Buckminster Fuller: Starting with the Universe”
The visionary 20th-century designer, inventor and teacher remains relevant and highly inspirational.

By T. J. Carlin

Whitney Museum of American Art, through Sept 21

2, 4, 6, 7... Frequency, Probably Alternate Method, Spherical Geodesic Octahedron
Photographs courtesy Special Collections, Morris Library, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Photograph by Leah Broaddus

Despite the celebrity of the geodesic dome (think Epcot Center), few know the mind behind its remarkable structure. “Buckminster Fuller: Starting with the Universe,” the Whitney’s exhibit on his life and work, should be mandatory viewing not just for those curious about the great visionary—whose ideas are increasingly relevant—but for anyone with a speck of concern about the fate of the planet. That is, for all of us.

At age 32, under challenging personal circumstances, Fuller (1895–1983) was contemplating suicide on the shore of Lake Michigan when he had a vision: He was surrounded by light and instructed that he belonged to the universe, and did not have the right to eliminate himself. From that moment on he dedicated himself to a “lifelong experiment” in service, “to find what a single individual can contribute to changing the world and benefiting all humanity.”

At the base of Fuller’s worldview was the idea that the earth’s resources are finite. He gained a lot by eschewing some of the obvious binaries that still cramp his successors’ thoughts today: Rather than view energy conservation as personal deprivation, he sought to minimize resource consumption while maximizing quality of life. Fuller saw the globe as a fragile entity hurtling through space, and accordingly, he coined the term “spaceship Earth.” In direct contrast to contemporaries like Robert Moses, Fuller thought both big and small, never forgetting that his constructions affected the lives of individuals. One or two people, working alone, could install many of his self-sufficient living units.
Boris Artzybasheff (1899–1965)
Photograph: Courtesy Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University

He was genuinely invested not just in ease of building, but in the accessibility of ideas. He argued that if complex science wasn’t easily comprehensible to a child, it was in danger of faulty logic. Teaching and lecturing remained central to his practice all his life—this is the man who rewrote “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” for use as a physics demonstration. His version is on view at the Whitney in a folding print called the TetraScroll.

At the heart of the exhibition lie Fuller’s drawings, scale models, photographs, and letters to and from friends, along with a geodesic dome modeled in cardboard and shiny relics of yesterday’s future, like the one surviving Dymaxion car, created in 1934. Fuller’s drawings, in particular, highlight his unique mash-up of art and design. One diagram details a “4D color progression” that reads like a synesthetic laundry list “from darkness through yellow of dawn through natural green through mechanical red.…”

Throughout the work presented here—and throughout his career—Fuller’s approach was characterized by vast overarching concepts, interdisciplinary reaches and design building blocks with widespread applications. One of his greatest gifts to the future was a resistance to notions of absolute ownership of resources. On the drawing One Ocean World Town he scrawled the phrase if MATERIALISM WINS, HUMANITY IS LICKED.

It can be difficult to convey the spirit of a visionary—the end products of genius are only traces of the mind that produced them. The Whitney wisely includes personal effects and, better, footage of Fuller talking about his work, world resources and the engineering phenomenon he called a “jitterbug thump.” He was notoriously long-winded, and his speech could be difficult to understand, but his panache and enthusiasm for his subjects shine through.

In a video called Buckminster Fuller Meets the Hippies in Golden Gate Park, he sits in a field among men in long beards and women in headbands, seriously engaging their concerns about the spiritual constraints of his geometric designs. That unlikely conversation epitomizes the enthusiasm and the drive toward cross-cultural connection that made him not just a great thinker but a great ambassador for his visions.

Fuller’s prioritization of the individual and of daily experience, combined with his concern for the future of the connected and finite system we call the planet, exemplify the kind of genius needed to solve our world’s continuing problems.

http://www.timeout.com/newyork/articles/art/48441/buckminster-fuller-starting-with-the-universe

Now it is appropriate to add to this thread, because I took Klyp Styx to the exhibit! I settled down in front of his Jitterbug (a truncated cube) video. I recreated the structure and his moves. I had kids helping me and adults watching and questioning... it was great. I built an oct tet truss and small sections of a floating compression on display to demonstrate the concepts.

the byg klyp styx kyd
(pronounced "the big clip sticks kid")
eric@klypstyx.com

Okay, I've started a tensegrity thread.

the byg klyp styx kyd
(pronounced "the big clip sticks kid")
eric@klypstyx.com

Klyp Styx is not a scam. It is a very simple, yet original idea that I have been able to patent. Many have already enjoyed my system. I hope you will have the opportunity to enjoy them as well. They can be seen at the unfinished website - klypstyx.com

the byg klyp styx kyd
(pronounced "the big clip sticks kid")
eric@klypstyx.com

Thanks for correcting the spelling.

the byg klyp styx kyd
(pronounced "the big clip sticks kid")
eric@klypstyx.com

Hi JH

Maybe Eric has an actual improvement in the modeling of tensegrity structures. I have not explored his work.

I don't know but I give him the benefit of the doubt. Bucky can, does and will inspire millions.

If it's a scam without integrity, it will vanish, so no need to be too concerned, imo.

Dick

Hi Eric

Nice going. We need all the improvements we can get. I wish you good luck and hope tons of kids profit from your modeling... I'm sure they will.

Simple is good!

Dick

Rather than piggybacking the Whitney thread, why not start a Forum thread on tensegrities (not "tensegreties")?

I have invented the quickest, slickest way to make tensegreties. I call it Klyp Styx (pronounced “clip sticks”). It is great for making Bucky balls and octet trusses and opens the doors to exploring space frames and other neat structures. Interested? Let me know - eric@klypstyx.com.

the byg klyp styx kyd
(pronounced "the big clip sticks kid")
eric@klypstyx.com