unbearable lightness





During design miami / basel 2010, carpenters workshop gallery (london) presented'unbearable lightness' by dutch designer tomáš gabzdil libertiny of studio libertiny. The small cabinet is a clean-room unit that has been constructed from custom aluminium profiles, glass sheets, rubber inserts and wooden beehives. The base plate of glass has been cut with a queen restrictor mesh, allowing worker-bees to access the encased structure from two hives hung beneath the cabinet.

Over the course of the fair, 40 000 worker bees were released into the case to complete a wax honeycomb structure over the figure of a martyred christ rising out of the chaos,his weight seeming to be upheld by the mass strength of the swarm. The figure within the vitrine is made of a laser sintered framework in which the industrious bees created a honeycomb skin over before filling each cell with the honey they produce. Then bees worked to remove the honey from the cells and return it to the beehive, cleaning the figure back to the wax cells they originally created.

http://www.designboom.com/weblog/cat/8/view/10622/studio-libertiny-unbearable-lightness.html