Culinary Misfits, a special catering service from Berlin

CulinaryMisfits is a design start-up born in Berlin, exploring the intersection of design and sustainability with a primary focus on food culture and how we can be inspired to rethink how we approach natural foods.

The founders are Lea Emma Rosa Brumsack and Tanja Krakowski. They create the first catering service to make its dishes using only ingredients discarded by supermarkets, farmers and restaurants

The idea is already explained in its name: misfits in fact means both "freak of nature" and "inappropriate", this word was chosen to challenge the widespread belief that the food is good only when it is looking good.

While it is true that the eye wants its part, it is equally true that appearances often deceive. So Lea and Tanja have chosen to use as ingredients only vegetables and fruits of the season because of their aesthetic inaccurate are rejected by large retailers and catering obeying strict criteria and aesthetic dimensions that determine a huge and unnecessary consuming food.

They collect veggies and fruits themselves and co-operate with two local organic farmers who let them have their abandoned harvest to a truly fair price- a substantial extra income for the farmers and a basis of business for Lea and Tanja.

With this second choice products Lea and Tanja create delicious dishes, minimizing waste and looking at the ingredients locally, thereby complying with the criteria of distribution at zero kilometers, without depriving their creations of quality and good taste.

After starting in early 2012, Culinary Misfits has at the moment a provvisory home in Kreuzberg. Now a crowdfunding campaign is underway to allow Culinary Misfits to have their own place for cooking, experimenting, lecturing and selling the little misfits.

More info:

www.culinarymisfits.de
Facebook page

photo credits Culinary Misfits

 

 

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Terra Stools: Adital Ela makes products from compressed earth

AditalEla, Israeli-born eco designer, in her new line "Terra" uses natural materials 100% organic to create pieces of furniture.

The main raw material is pressed earth and natural fibers, hence the name of the project, the first product for her line Terra is "Terra Stools".

They are made using a unique compression process that was developed based on a long term study of materials and of ancient building methods, inspired craftsmanship techniques commonly used in India or the Middle East. On this process she learned from Daphna Yalon, Tal Bashan, Um Ajaj, her Iraqi grandmother (that made her own oven from dirt turned to clay) and many more.

In this project she acts as a “designer-gatherer”, all materials were gathered from construction and agricultural waste, including faeces and dung, and from the natural environment. 

 After having pressed the materials, giving it a form, each object receives a natural finish, is necessary to protect that to polishing, which is carried out by the use of oil of linseed.

Each stool is handmade and is an almost unique piece, is completely natural, eco-friendly and completely free of pollutants. Making a Terra stool creates no pollution. It requires no energy and uses only local and organic materials. If a stool is no longer useful, the owner can simply leave it in the garden and let it deteriorate back into the earth. Or they can add water and mold it into another functional object.

Adital Ela believes that its objects can adapt to any type of furniture that too from outside, where too often makes use of the ubiquitous plastic.

She is also preparing to launch a pilot program in Jerusalem of Terra workshops, which she hopes will spread in a franchise-like manner, Eventually, she wonders: could this be a source of income for income deprived communities?

Adital Ela is the founder and the director of S-Sense Design Studio.

The studio's work is based on three pillars:

Planet - Design of products and services that support sustainability.

People - Design that empowers people and communities.

Value - The promotion of sustainable design thinking action and education.

More info

www.aditalela.com

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Italian Pavillon in the 55th Venice Biennale: vice versa, exhibition and crowdfounding project

Padiglione Italia, ph RobertoGalasso

It was presented yesterday in Rome "vice versa," the exhibition curated by Bartolomeo Pietromarchi that will be the Italian Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennial, from June 1 to November 24, 2013.

vice versa will consist of seven rooms (specifically: 6 adjoining rooms plus a garden of thousand square meters) set up inside the Italian Pavilion, with seven pairs of artists, sometimes also combined between generations distant. The names: Fabio Mauri and Francesco Arena, Luigi Ghirri and Luca Vitone, Marcello Maloberti and Flavio Favelli, Gianfranco Baruchello and Elisabetta Benassi, Francesca Grilli and Massimo Bartolini, Piero Golia and Sislej Xhafa, Giulio Paolini, Marco Tirelli.

vice versa picks up on a concept introduced by Giorgio Agamben in his book Categorie italiane. Studi di Poetica (1996), in which the philosopher maintained that in order to interpret Italian culture, we must identify a “series of diametrically linked concepts” capable of describing its underlying characteristics – binomials like tragedy/comedy, architecture/vagueness and speed/lightness thus become original keys for reading the fundamental works and artists of our cultural history.

But with 600 000 euro provided by the institution - they say - you do not get to cover everything. The amount is certainly less than those handed out in previous years, but are even a little money from here a call for help.

To the idea curatorial background, Pietromarchi added a gimmick, cool in this period, which serves as a support for the work: it is called "crowdfunding" procedures blossomed within the underground, now also paid to public giants. It is the old method "Collect", reformulated in key 2.0: people recruited on the web, married a project and give a contribution, receiving in return a small benefit.

The crisis leads to the development of new formulas, in which solidarity, cooperation, creativity, networking, communication, make a difference.

Bartolomeo Pietromarchi during the press conference

The project will be launched by February 12th, the collection will have a period of ninety days and has set itself the target of at least fifty thousand euro. Everyone can participate and support the event, drawing an "advantage" of treatment, for example, the visit to the exhibition, plus the name of each supporter will appear at the entrance, in the catalog and on the website of vice versa with distribution folder with prints of the works in a limited edition , numbered and signed in original.

The crowdfunding, inspired by similar initiatives implemented at the Louvre with "Tous Mécènes" and "Let's build a GoddamTesla Museum" in the United States will be inaugurated with events in Rome, Milan, London and New York.

The ability to have these methods of generating consensus, participation, responsiveness and social feeling, is very high. And it is an absolute winner, from the point of view of cultural and ethical, even before the financial.

Destination of funds gathered through crowdfunding

Funds gathered through crowdfunding will be designated, in agreement with the Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities, for the financing of various initiatives for the exhibition vice versa at the Italian Pavilion at the 55th International Art Exposition, including:

- Additional funding for artists’ works and productions

- Cultural mediation and educational activities geared towards schools, universities and visitors

- Promotional and communications activities, including a vice versa exhibition App

- Organization of encounters with artists and opinion leaders and a concluding conference on the themes of the Italian Pavilion

Possible financing targets and destination of relative funds

Based on the amount of funds raised, the following activities may be supported in different ways:

- €50,000 designated to support:

Additional funding for the artists’ work and productions

- €70,000 designated to support:

Additional funding for the artists’ work and productions

Cultural mediation/educational activities geared towards schools, universities and visitors

- €100,000 designated to support:

Additional funding for the artists’ work and productions

Cultural mediation/educational activities geared towards schools, universities and visitors

Promotional and communications activities, including the creation of a vice versa exhibition App

- €120,000 designated to support:

Additional funding for the artists’ work and productions

Cultural mediation/educational activities geared towards schools, universities and visitors

Promotional and communications activities, including the creation of a vice versa exhibition App

Organization of encounters with artists and opinion leaders and a concluding conference on the themes of the Italian Pavilion

More info

www.viceversa2013.org

55th Venice Art Biennal

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Please take a seat. Chairs for Abu Dhabi by Tadashi Kawamata

In November 2012 Japanese artist Tadashi Kawamata created the soaring 20-foot-high a kind of like a rotunda, a round tower, made by 1000 chairs and to construct with 20 people at the site. Called "Chairs For Abu Dhabi", the ephemeral construction invited people to walk through it and take a rest in one of the comfy seats inside it. The work is not limited to an architectural study: it is concerned with the social context in which it is presented. "This time I did it, it's not a specific chair at all," said the artist. "It's more of a mixture of all kinds of wooden, metal, colorful chairs - everything. Because here in Abu Dhabi it's such an international city and a lot of people come from all over the world, and I wanted to put a mixture - even a couch."

AbuDhabi Art is a reality for contemporary art and design as well as a carefully curated public programme. It is an international platform aiming to create awareness, education and continuation of artistic and cultural interest through the selected exhibited galleries, vast showcased works and talking platforms by art world academics, connoisseurs, patrons and leading and emerging artists from all fields of the visual arts.

Born in Hokkaido, Japan, in 1953 Kawamata has been featured in important international events from a very young age, at 28 years old he was chosen to be a participating artist in the Venice Biennial. Having since taken part in Documenta and international exhibitions, he has achieved high acclaim in Europe and around the world. He creates smashing art installations using scrap materials and re-purposed objects like pallets, waste wood etc. Kawamata's work transcends the art context and extends to fields such as architecture and city planning, history, sociology, everyday communication, and even medical treatment.

‘Chairs for Abu Dhabi’ took Kawamata a whole week, many hundreds of chairs to build this installation in Manarat al Saadiyat. Stacked layers of chairs form this six meter-high edifice, which was part of the fair’s BEYOND section (known for its display of large-scale works and sculptures), which sold. Was one of the main attractions at Abu Dhabi’s 2012 Biennale, and where it provided the bustling event with an iconic Eco-friendly pavilion that was difficult to miss. Formidable, convenient and unique, the shelter served as a popular meeting point throughout the festival. It symbolically link the people who enter it, Mr Kawamata said.

"An empty chair is waiting for the people to sit down, and then a chair is connecting to the other chair," he explained. "So it's really like a waiting spot, open for everybody to sit down. That's kind of the metaphor we're using."

More info

TadeshiKawamata

www.abudhabiartfair.ae

photo credit Abu Dhabi Art and Pazo Molinos de Antero

 

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Sunday Soup, contemporary, tasty and creative idea for fundraising

The initiative was born in the United States as of Sunday Soup and the formula is that a group of people come together to share a meal and that meal is sold for an affordable price, and in the while there is presentation of several projects to start or already started. The result, once covered the costs of spending, will give as a grant to support a creative project, everyone who purchases the meal gets one vote to determine who receives the grant. 

The Sunday Soup is therefore a basic model for the funding of creative projects of small and medium size through a meal as a group.

The creation of a group that uses the basic model of the Sunday Soup generate independent funding and dialogue on the availability and distribution of resources within the cultural, artistic and social, both at local and national level.

Granting projects affiliated with Sunday Soup in different cities operate based on their own needs and context, you can see online the map of thenetwork. The meals are more or less elaborate in different places and some people have presentations by potential grantees or past grantees as part of the event.

The founders explain the things with these words: "This enables us to stimulate and promote experimental, critical and imaginative practices that may not be eligible for formal funding. The Soup grant, while raising money, also serves as a way to build a network of support and community that reaches beyond purely monetary assistance. We like to think of it as an open platform to discuss ongoing projects with new audiences, meet new collaborators, and share ways of working. "

Sunday Soup is therefore a participatory manner with the times in order to achieve the financing of projects in every field of art through food and sharing a platform, but there are many others, maintained by the users to solve problems that feel important without expect solutions defined and financed from above.

More info

www.sundaysoup.org

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AfriGadget arrives to the larger screens of broadcast television

AfriGadget is a multi-authored blog created by tech expert Erik Hersmande, dedicated to simple, sustainable inventions in Africa. It is a testament to Africans bending the little they have to their will, using creativity to overcome life’s challenges.

AfriGadget in these days have decide to implement itself, with a passage from the small screens of laptops to the larger screens of broadcast television. The production company Made in Africa TV is taking AfriGadget to the East African airwaves to inspire millions of viewers to become active creators of new and ingenious products, themselves.

Made in Africa TV plans to produce AfriGadget as separate programs in each of the Kenyan, Tanzanian and Ugandan television markets. A local presenter will host the program and introduce the correspondents and their stories.

Each episode of AfriGadget TV will consist of five thoughtful stories from around the region, highlighting remarkable and unexpected hardware innovations by East Africans. These stories are inspiring mini-documentaries, portraying young and old, men and women, as well as high and low-tech innovators and their products.

"Made in Africa TV is an East African social enterprise producing mass media with a social impact. We are in the process of setting up a network of video journalists from across Africa to produce the stories, which will be made available on the website as well. As an AfriGadget TV-correspondent you explore your local surroundings to find and capture the innovators and their AfriGadgets. If you are a videographer willing to become a correspondent for this program, or if you know of great AfriGadgets that should be considered for inclusion, please send an email to afrigadget@gmail.com"

More info

www.afrigadget.com

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Sunday's Tale - Maker Faire Africa: schoolgirls create an urine-powered generator

Sunday's Tale: a post from the past.

This story comes from Maker Faire Africa 2012, in Lagos. This is a popular event across the African continent, drawing thousands of participants who travel to Lagos to show their inventions and other practical creations.

As the Next Web describes it, the Maker Faire is intended to highlight creations "that solve immediate challenges and problems, and then works to support and propagate them. Put another way, this isn't just a bunch of rich people talking about how their apps are going to change the world."

Possibly one of the more unexpected products at Faire is a urine powered generator, created by four young students. The girls are Duro-Aina Adebola (14), Akindele Abiola (14), Faleke Oluwatoyin (14) and Bello Eniola (15).

It produces electricity for six hours using a single liter of urine as fuel.

So how exactly does the urine-powered generator work?

Urine is put into an electrolytic cell, which separates out the hydrogen.

The hydrogen goes into a water filter for purification, which then gets pushed into the gas cylinder.

The gas cylinder pushes hydrogen into a cylinder of liquid borax, which is used to remove the moisture from the hydrogen gas.

This purified hydrogen gas is pushed into the generator.

Along the whole way there are one-way valves for security, but let’s be honest that this is something of an explosive device…

Note: This is an experiment more than a real new tool for electricity generation. The net power output is negative due to the energy needed to get the hydrogen from the urine through electrolysis. These issues, coupled with the complexities of storing hydrogen safely, mean the generator may not be an immediately marketable prospect, but it demonstrates the potential for using the abundant resource that is urine to create valuable products.

Photo credit Maker Fair Africa

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