solarCLOUD harvesting solar energy for Masdar City | superspace

solarCLOUD is a LandArt object, located at the city portal of Masdar City, which consists of a group of solar balloons woven with solar fabric, that creates a shaded park in the daytime, tracking and harvesting solar energy with the daily movements of the sun, instinctively behaves as a kinetic sculpture, and settles down at night providing a basis for digital real-time light art shows simultaneously designed by artists as well as its users.

background

energy production, which is no older than two centuries, has triggered industry age and shaped our cities from the beginning of the 20th century. day by day, industries and cities has spread and grew all over the world and produced an endless need for energy. while on the verge of the first quarter of the 21st century, we are not just looking forward to producing energy, we are also inventing ‘green’ and ‘user-friendly’ power plants and energy production. thus, in the more near future, as the technology gets more user-friendly and accessible, energy production will be a part of the daily routine of urban life, and nature would be more clean and independent and humanity will also be more self-sufficient. 

idea

masdar is a 21st-century urban laboratory, not only with its energy and sustainable policy but also urban and environmental approach. masdar would be a sustainable, efficient, high tech, but also the innovative proud face of our century. technology is not always and only the most efficient way of creating optimum solutions for urbanism and the environment. it should be touching ‘the souls of the population’ and generate a ‘communication’ with ‘inhabitants’ and remind that “we are living here together”. with this sense of humor, our project offers "a place for the community", "a gathering place for all" while creating energy for electricity and also creating energy for life within the biologic rhythm of the earth, connecting to the anima of earth and sun to the ‘neighborhood’ also with the possibilities of ‘an attraction point’ which may become the ‘heart of the city’ that everyone can find something to connect. 

creating landmark

a landmark is not only a memorable space with its spectacular and well-known imagery but also an appeal on the sense of individuals and society and unites them virtually under its roof with its symbolism for different kinds of emotions flowing into the same pot and still being worthy to feel. in that manner, our project consists of a group of mini ‘solar balloons’ gathering together as the society comes together for a bigger reason, in this case, hunting renewable energy; a modular and holistic sculpture, which starts moving by the day for catching the worthy and limitless energy of the sun, a relaxable shaded aggregation square for inhabitants, turns itself into a digital art platform at night, as the moon lits up, having ‘limitless’ amount of shapes and light, a sculpture that is hung in the air, a sculpture that never settles down, a sculpture, like a living creature, living as humans and many other animals and plants go with the circadian rhythm of life. 

a place for community

the cities are designed around a center to gather people together, for thousands of years. from ancients to Rome, and today's most crowded and demanding cities, squares, open spaces, parks, voids, attraction points making the cities alive and they are all indispensable parts of the cities. today ‘experience’ is one of the most important elements to form new urban life in future cities. our project creating a strong ground level, shaded and climatized by a ‘solar cloud’ at day time, turns into a ‘media cloud’ hosting many artists and artworks all over the world, bringing a great experience for its visitors.

a field of balloons 

there are too many ways of harvesting the sun. we are planting 1500 solar ‘balloons’  on our field of community, covered with a ‘solar fabric’ which is one of the latest products of the solar industry. once planting a balloon on the site, it would behave like a crop, growing daily and catching the sun for ‘electric energy’.

a moving sculpture

like ‘sunflowers’ triggered by the ‘sun’ and followed it every day like a ‘moving sculpture’, our ‘solar balloons’ would start to ‘rise’ by using the heat of the sun to catch more daylight to generate electric energy from the sun, also triggering the ‘roller’ for mechanical energy. it would generate an ‘endless variational cloud’ every single day, also generating and providing a moving shade underneath.

a media art platform: solartcloud

while the cloud is hunting sun in daytime and shading for the podium, nighttime balloons descend to a specified height, after losing their heat energy inside, and becoming individual ‘pixels’ of a 1500 balloon ‘media cloud’. solartcloud is a programmable digital platform, which would become an open-air ‘new media museum’ that host many artists all over the world, scheduled for ‘changing and refreshing content’ monthly, weekly and daily programs from different artists.

in this era of the internet and digitally enhanced IoT technologies, a community fosters not only in actual spaces but also in virtual ones, and sometimes more than easily. this place could serve as an interface for both, even living a double simultaneous life of dark and light in the realms of cyberspace and masdar at the same time. new technologies can be promoted. mixed reality applications could also be of service in special events or festivals.

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