Announcing the 2023-2024 Beam Project Governors Island
We are excited to announce our 2023 -2024 Beam Project Governors Island: seeAsaw, to be built at Beam Camp City during summer 2023. Each year, Beam Center builds large-scale public artworks through collaborations with youth and these projects are displayed across three locations: Beam Camp in Strafford, NH, Beam Camp City on Governors Island, and in a local NYC community.
seeAsaw is an interactive and immersive structure of 6 seesaws, connected by a spectacular draping hammock made from rescued fishing nets, which moves in wave-like motions that are reminiscent of the sea. seeAsaw was designed by Andre kong studio in collaboration with Ruben Correia and Ghost Diving USA. Andre kong studio is an emerging London-based design and architecture practice led by Andre Sampaio Kong. The artists designed seeAsaw to raise awareness of the challenges posed by ocean pollution and to pave the way forward by reusing ‘ghost nets’ that pose threats to marine ecosystems.
Andre Kong
Ruben Correia
Ruben Correia is a structural engineer with over eight years professional experience working in the UK, Australia, and Portugal. He is passionate about structural expression in design and integrated collaborative interdisciplinary design.
Andre Kong studied architecture at The University of Edinburgh and the Royal College of Art. He has over 8 years of experience in developing and leading ambitious projects across all scales and sectors for international practices including Heatherwick Studio, where he is also a part-time Senior Associate.
Norbert Lee of Ghost Diving USA
Image courtesy of ghostdiving.org
Ghost Diving is a registered charity founded in 2012 and run by technical divers who have specialized in the removal of lost fishing gear and other marine debris since 2009. The USA Chapter is coordinated by Norbert Lee whose team will be supporting Beam Camp City, diving and collecting nets as well as sharing knowledge and raising awareness.
Campers and youth staff at Beam Camp City will collaborate with Beam Staff and our designers to build seeAsaw. The designers state that they are inviting campers to make a difference through building seeAsaw. They said, “With seeAsaw, we invite campers to jointly effect change – by building, by moving, and by choreographing sound and movement. The project is all about collaboration, balance, and making waves: collaborating to build a structure, creating synchronized wave effects through collective balance, and figuratively making waves by raising awareness of one of the many problems of the urgent climate crisis we are in.”
As we count down to summer 2023, stay tuned for some behind-the-scenes looks at the planning and prototyping process.
