RENE BAKKER

Res Sapiens II

For Lustlab and Pieke Bergmans I engineered and built two robotic lights. They express 80 different emotions with their body, based on Twitterfeeds and breaking news...

While they were showed at the Centre Pompidou from May to August 2012, Lamp 014 sensed feelings in the vicinity of Paris while Lamp 015 detected worldwide opinions about current significant wikipedia topics.

They were also shown at Transnatural festivalTransnatural festival in Nemo, Amsterdam september / oktober 2012.

Portrait Landscape Machine

Since the beginning of 2011 I am working with artist collective The User, based in Montreal, Canada.

I am engineering the mechanical structure of a new piece of art called: "Portrait Landscape Machine"

The goal of this piece of art is to print sculpted faces, only using sand and water.
In December 2011 we delivered proof of concept by finishing a working prototype.

Check the first succesfull print:

And some pictures:

Bill, printed in sand.

Rainbowgun

I developed a tool fo Letman last year, the Rainbowgun, allowing the user to paint with 7 spray-cans simultaneously.

Check it out in this remarkable performance, made for: If you could collaborate

Ideofoon 1

I rebuilt Ideofoon 1 by Dick Raaijmakers . The project is commissioned by the Witteveen+Bos Prijs.

The artwork was created by Dick Raaijmakers in 1970 and is considered lost. Hence the build of this replica.

Descripition:
Ideofoon 1 is an installation with 36 speaker which produce their own sound. Caused by shortcircuits, gravity, bouncing chrome balls and more. Materials are: various types of metal, wood, electronics and mechanics.

@Bergkerk, Deventer, The Netherlands

Light objects for Asko|Schönberg

In collaboration with Theun Mosk I built 5 identical light objects. They are triangular, having 3 panels with different textures. The lights are moved and turned on stage by the musicians. The first appearance was December 16th: "Dutch Design” by Asko|Schönberg in Muziekgebouw aan ‘t Ij in Amsterdam… It was a great night.

Servosirens

Gradually my musical sireninstruments are evolving into versatile and well playable instruments. Simple to set up, simple controls and complete control in tune / volume / oscillation and more.

Test setup with Daan:

Ton playing the first tunes:

Helmholtz Doppelsiren

As part of a research in the origin in electronic music, I developed and built a variety of instruments based upon historical information and patents by scientists and musicians. Among them are Hermann Helmholtz, Luigio Russolo and Henri Naber.

The most advanced instrument is my interpretation of the Helmholtz Doppelsiren.
An instrument he used extensively to prove sound theories.

I prototyped a working instrument and then redesigned parts, based on the prototype. For production I seeked collaboration with a CNC-machining company; Rijfers Metaalbewerking in Alphen a/d Rijn.
High precision is critical. For musical variables, like pitch, timbre, volume, harmonics, interference and more. But precision is also important for the ability to reproduce the same sounds with the siren-instrument, over and over again; studying the instrument.

The instruments are used in a variety of concerts, theaterpieces and workshops. They are a part of the Siren Orchestra of theater ensemble Veenfabriek.

Recordings by Kees Tazelaar