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Disco Inferno At UCLA Creates Amorphous Oddities

Disco Inferno At UCLA Creates Amorphous Oddities

In a city obsessed with spectacle, it seems only fitting that graduate architecture students at UCLA would investigate the subject in one of its most literal forms. The students (including the author of this blog post) have designed objects, known collectively as Space Oddities, or Variations on the Disco Ball, for a 10-week technology and construction seminar led by professor Jasson Payne. The pieces, morphed from their disco ball origins, are now neither spherical nor symmetrical. Hung in a darkened gallery, they cast a dizzying array of reflections, shapes, shadows, and forms across the room.

Meant to mingle the roles of design, craft, and digital technology, the objects were developed using digital software and milled out of high-density foam before being hand tiled with laser cut acrylic or glass mirrored tiles (or in one case, fake finger nails). The result: a unique relationship between the form and its material finish.

Based on studies developed by Payne’s office Hirsuta the seminar was designed to pose the question, “Is it possible for an object with such distinct and established identity to blur its own associations toward novel readings?” Space Oddities, or Variations on the Disco Ball will be on display from 9am to 5pm until April 2 at Perloff Hall room 1220.


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