Cloud is Cool

‘Cloud’ is a sculpture created for a British Airways terminal by the London art and design studio Troika. You really have to take a look at it to fully appreciate it, but I think the concept alone is pretty novel:

…we created ‘Cloud’, a five meter long digital sculpture whose surface is covered with 4638 flip-dots that can be individually addressed by a computer to animate the entire skin of the sculpture. Flip-dots were conventionally used in the 70s and 80s to create signs in train-stations and airports. We were fascinated by their materiality, by the way they physically flip from one side to the other. The sound they generate is also instantly reminiscent of travel, and we therefore decided to explore their aesthetic potential in ‘Cloud’.

I love that they took the “Flip-dots”, something simple and mechanical, that has been around for quite a while, and turned them into a work of art that is so high-tech.