DAY 328

UNEXPECTED ART FORMS

Strandbeest

THEO JANSEN’S BEACH CREATURES

The first time I watched a video of Theo Jansen’s Beach Creatures, I felt as if I were witnessing some sort of absinthe-induced hallucination. The visage of the beasts is so mythical—their movements so fluid and seamless—that they appear to have wandered right off the set of some Steven Spielberg film.

After verifying the reality of these creatures, I turned to a second question: what are they, exactly?

Jansen, an engineer by profession, matter-of-factly describes the creatures as “skeletons that are able to walk on the wind.” Others have called them “wind-powered robots” or “kinetic structures.” All of these descriptions fit: The inorganic beasts use translucent fins to harness the wind and propel themselves across the surface of the beaches of Holland.

“The walls between art and engineering exist only in our minds,” states their creator.

Jansen continues to increase the structural sophistication of these creatures. He hopes to release a herd of them into the wild someday, free to roam and interact with each other on their own. —DJS