The Digital Junkyard is an experiment in virtual salvage. It is a repository of donated digital information that is used to generate real physical and spatial objects...This project is an embodiment of the growing collective intelligence that technology affords us; and an experiment in ideas about digital ecology. It also honours the time and energy that designers put into testing and making mistakes. — digital junkyard
No, this isn't some snarky Craigslist ad. Recently launched by architecturally trained designer and artist Car Martin, the Digital Junkyard is a website with a mission to transform as much of your unwanted vector files into a new physical object or creative idea of sorts, in the real world. In addition to "dumping" their files, users can "salvage" and download donated files, and can eventually check out the resulting "artifacts" -- although that section of the site is yet to be filled.
The Digital Junkyard accepts a maximum of 250 MB and is mainly looking for vector files. More specifically:
Screenshot via djunkyard.com
While the Digital Junkyard can be a practical outlet for architects and designers to clear up their digital workspaces, Martin's website has an introspective side to it that is greatly relevant at this point in our tightening relationship with information technology. In a way, it also celebrates the creative process itself.
In a reflective blog post about "thought ecology", Martin writes that she got inspiration for the Digital Junkyard from Susan Sontag’s collection of essays, "On Photography", which explores the relationships between physical things and information production/reproduction.
Martin writes:
"We have reached an age with information technology where the split between the virtual and the real has become blurred, as we witness potentially the third great technological revolution, the lines between physical production and idea generation have never been so thin...However, as we make things, we also make mistakes, we throw things away before they are produced, we make changes and then we scrap parts of ideas. It is possible that there are tiny fragments, physical ideas that we put intellectual energy into creating, that could be saved and clustered into something useful, or something brilliant, or beautiful."
Check out the website here, and start dumpin' away.
7 Comments
guys I gotta go take a dump ..
Garbage in, garbage out.
first garbage in: not 'c' blocks
You know what else sucks? Puppies suck. Jesus sucks. Moms, definitely moms suck. Putting on socks before I put pants on sucks. Brushing my hair sucks. Eating my vegetables, sucks. Red lights suck. Darwin sucks. Madame Curie sucks. Rauschenberg sucks. Oh yeah, did I mention, puppies?
have tons to dump....this is an art project right? pretty cool.
just unloaded a truck load of unfinished competition entry model sketches.
I just dumped b3ta's comment into googletranslate and hit "Maori".
E mohio ana koe he aha atu ngotea ? Te u papi . Ngotea Ihu . Vahine , tino u, vahine . Maka ana i runga i tōkena i mua i hoatu e ahau tarau ki runga ki ngotea . Taitainga e toku makawe ngotea . E kai i oku huawhenua , ngotea . U, rama Whero . Darwin ngotea . Madame Curie ngotea . Rauschenberg ngotea . Aue yeah , i ahau whakahua , papi ?
See, there's always something to learn: In Maori, "ngotea" equals "sucks".
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