Anya Gallaccio
Between thought and feeling

The children at the Kasterlinden Institute in Belgium suffer from visual, hearing and language impairments as well as autistic disorders. Scottish artist and Turner Prize nominee Anya Gallaccio created a particular work for the school's garden in response to the exclusion that affects these children: Between thought and feeling. The first proposals involved anatomical models of the complex inner ear, eye and throat canals that required advanced 3d modelling.

One year into the process Unfold was brought in to pick up the development of the project, this after the artist - who lives in California - attended the Data-Clay conference at the California College of the Arts where Unfold gave the keynote speech. Impressed by Unfold's approach towards interweaving digital technologies with traditional materials and processes, she asked us to develop the project from first concept sketches towards final installation.

Gallaccio's concept was built around surfacing the inner shapes of our organs connected to the senses: ear, nose, mouth; and enlarging those so they become spaces for kids to explore with their senses.

The children at the Kasterlinden Institute in Belgium suffer from visual, hearing and language impairments as well as autistic disorders. Scottish artist and Turner Prize nominee Anya Gallaccio created a particular work for the school's garden in response to the exclusion that affects these children: Between thought and feeling. The first proposals involved anatomical models of the complex inner ear, eye and throat canals that required advanced 3d modelling.

One year into the process Unfold was brought in to pick up the development of the project, this after the artist - who lives in California - attended the Data-Clay conference at the California College of the Arts where Unfold gave the keynote speech. Impressed by Unfold's approach towards interweaving digital technologies with traditional materials and processes, she asked us to develop the project from first concept sketches towards final installation.

Gallaccio's concept was built around surfacing the inner shapes of our organs connected to the senses: ear, nose, mouth; and enlarging those so they become spaces for kids to explore with their senses.

Using open-source software, Unfold extracted these 3D geometries from medical MRI scans. Once these models were available, a series of primitive geometric shapes with subtracted cavities were explored in combination with research of various production processes and materials suitable for the sculpture. One of the challenges was to make the artwork comply with playground regulations since the sculptures were always conceived as embraceable, explorable and playable spaces.



fig. 01, 3-8, 11-16: photography by Unfold
fig. 02: photography by The New Patrons
fig. 09-10: by Anya Gallaccio