Dynamorph | Orproject

Dynamorph has been designed for the exhibition on Shamanism for the International Cultural Institute during the Venice Biennale 2014. The pavilion exhibits Nepalese shamanic artifacts and has been designed to visualise 'Urja', the force/energy which the shamans attempt to control through their practices. Positioned between the exhibits and the room, Dynamorph is an isosurface that envelopes the visitors and forms a surreal, mystical cave that interfaces between the present and the past. The branching and flowing geometry of Dynamorph evokes the symbolism of roots, trunks and branches that form the three worlds of shamanism. The geometry of Dynamorph has been developed using an algorithm that places the exhibits as centers of a gravitational force-field acting on the surface of the room. As the volume is pulled and distorted towards these centers, it splits and branches to form a continuous envelope. The visitors enter the forcefield of the exhibits and are guided in their journey by the physical installation. Made up of over three thousand individual segments, the tessellated geometry resembles mass and movements found in nature similar to the trajectory of planetary mass under the influence of stars and black holes, the formation of cumulonimbus clouds guided by winds, pressure and temperature variations, or the interaction between electromagnetic fields and subatomic particles. In Dynamorph, the 'Urja' of the exhibit influences the movement of the visitors and the surface becomes the physical manifestation of both.