Tipping Point

PROJECT 800 sqm exhibition on contemporary sustainability Mars - Juni 2012

CLIENT Stockholm Cultural House

EXPERTS IN SUSTAINABILITY RESEARCH Stockholm Resilience Centre

TOOLS & SKILLS Concept design, , storytelling, architecture, graphic design, multimedia production, physical space

WHAT The exhibition Tipping Point makes use of art and design to present an inspirational take on the various aspects of contemporary sustainable development. Guringo participated in the concept development, produced the overall design, custom- made exhibits and a number of films in the exhibition.

THE NARRATIVE Sustainability issues are challenging to communicate as they can be highly stigmatized and consist of complex coherent representations. Deep, dystopian scenarios are quickly painted and the high level of complexity makes things almost impossible to grasp.

In order to avoid this pitfall we chose to narrate a positive, non linear and intuitively intriguing experience based on the main scientific insights delivered by Stockholm Resilience Centre (SRC).

An experiential environment was created that visitors could to explore in a non-linear solution. Insights were placed in a pattern whose combined message was that we are all part of nature. The exhibition featured everything from examples of citizen-initiated cultivation projects to the knowledge that we have now entered the anthropocene: the age at which humans are the single largest influencing factor of the planet's climate.

THE ENTRANCE to the exhibition was through a frozen explosion of transportation crates and products of mass consumtion mixed with digital displays of videoart onthe subjects.

THE SYSTEMS ROOM Through the “exploding” entrance visitors would enter the spatial experience of the"control room”.

THE WATER MACHINE A rusty Victorian interpretation of the water cycle. Via ahidden sensor can a visitor activate a a steam engine that generates a rigid cloud. It drops into a water staircase and continues on to the machine.

At the end of the machine the water continuous down into a monitor.

Here is the story of water being told by a lifetime surfer and his relation to water.

THE PLANETARY BOUNDARIES concept transformed into a immersive sculpture.

STORYBOARDING THE EXHIBITION Before building the exhibition for real, every station of the exhibition experience was storyboarded more or less like one would do with a movie. By doing so we got the chance to analyze the flow, the dynamics and the scientific content the exhibition and optimize the whole experience.

THE OLD REFRIGERATOR A retired refrigerator calls out to the visitor. He is telling the history of the ozone and the uncertainty / safety of the research. How humanity actually managed to solve the problem with the ozone layer at the same time as we got horribly close to waste it completely.

THE URBAN COCKTAIL This station consisted of six reversible human silhouettes of natural size. They were attached to a shaft in the floor as well as in a P.B tentacle connecting them to the Planetary Boundaries funnel. The visitor could spin them and see two different pages.
Speakers in each silhouette played the sound of a cocktail party. The visitor could walk around among the silhouettes and eavesdrop to conversations held between the researchers who contributed the fact to the exhibition.
On the silhouettes there were urban themed posters on one side and on the other side texts such as "There is nothing unnatural with NY city". Floods of metal objects, houses of land etc. Artwork by Puppet.

THE FALLING SCIENTIST A black doll with research outfit hangs in the middle of the roof. He has a screen on the stomach that introduces the planetary boundaries. When a visitor got right underneath the falling scientist, a sound shower hit and you got to hear the old funny story of the guy falling from the roof of a skyscraper. Every time he passes a floor on his way to his inevitable death he keeps repeating - So far everything is ok, so far everything is ok...

The installation is addressing the problem that arouses when scientists desperately tries to create explanation models for complex systems.