Introduction

"Now that man has developed means of duplicating media (printing, copyshops, Napster, video recorders...) we are on the threshold of the age of the liquefaction of the three-dimensional world. If developments in manufacturing equipment proceed at the same pace as developments in the rest of the technological world (and in the associated media*), we can expect the entire production sector to be transformed rapidly within a short space of time. In other words, we are about to experience a radical redefinition of production facilities, general productivity and the accompanying capabilities of our daily environment. 

The current economic crisis is the result of the leap/shift that is now possible and the fear of the consequences that this shift will have. When power, that is to say production facilities, are consistently decentralized, a new relationship between users and manufacturers automatically occurs. "Conventional industry" is afraid of this, since the resulting responsibilities and the associated restructuring processes mean that the entire production system needs to be adapted to new conditions.

The question is, when are we going to realize that this step involves changes in the fields of work, individualism and lifestyle? Our interaction with everyday things is only a metaphor for how, in future, the spatial world can be manipulated by the individual."

Starting on July 7, Vogt+Weizenegger and their team will be using a 3-D machine to realize ideas in the gallery.

Once again, Vogt+Weizenegger (V+W) will be following the principle of change of context, something it has used throughout the world to question the boundaries between art, design and artistic handicrafts. V+W has received international attention with interventionist projects including work in the Berlin Institute for the Blind (DIM, THE IMAGINATION MANUFACTURY) such as Blaupause (Blueprints) and other do-it-yourself projects...

For the duration of the production period, the gallery is thus mutating into a construction site, creating three-dimensional images which will not be exhibited as such until they are finished, at the beginning of September. Until then, the gallery will become a scene of the production of prototypes of object-related ideas. What is being exhibited is a process, one that, in this public space, shows itself to be on principal alterable and interactive. 

Plan A is an exhibition of a new kind of production process in the exhibition rooms of Galerie Schipper & Krome. The establishment of production facilities in the field of techno music was perhaps the first example of how it is possible to manufacture and design using the smallest of production units. The copy/paste principle has also always been an integral part of Vogt+Weizenegger's modus operandi.

The 3-D system's innovative wax modeling machine now makes it possible to link the design process directly to the production and exhibition processes. The resultant process acceleration makes it possible to modify an object immediately after it has been designed.

Making this process public and involving outsiders in it is unusual not only in design circles but also generally in all inventive disciplines, but it is the way forward. In the future, design centers will orient themselves even more closely to individual requirements. The production of all abstract and two-dimensional ideas will be implemented, so to speak, in the copy shop.

Concretization and the realization of ideas will become possible almost immediately. However, it is possible that the role of the beholder/customer will change fundamentally. The role of the designer definitely will. 

The gallery is showing a metaphorical installation of this future model...