This is happening today. Just at the intersection of the former NRE energy park Eindhoven. The municipality of Eindhoven inaugurates an impressive 3D printed monument from visual artist Titia Ex. The sculpture isa tribute to Jan Zwartendijk and many invisible resistance heroes from the region during the Second World War.
Named “Loom Light“, the interactive light artwork marks 75 years of living in freedom for inhabitants. Commissioned by the municipality of Eindhoven, in the Netherlands, Belgium-based companies Colossus Printers & OMD3D ensured its fabrication.
As a reminder, Colossus is a Belgium-based start-up that develops a large 3D printer with the same name. OMD3D on the other hand, is a 3D printing service provider run by Peter De Corte, and his wife Iris Vercruysse. Both companies have been working together for several years now. The Loom Light portrays the type of large-scale projects they are used to work on.
Loom Light
Even though the producers did not highlight it, the work of art also embodies the advantages of circular economy for AM. Indeed, it is made up of recycled plastics and the work consists of a 1500 KG steel frame with more than 20,000 individually controllable LEDs.
Described as one of the largest 3D printed works of art in Europe and made from recycled plastics, it has a diameter of approximately 3.50 meters and fans from 4.50 meters to almost 6 meters high.
Tita Ex explains that the LEDs are interactive, and the artwork responds to the visitor approaching or walking through the work. This symbolizes the importance of each individual’s acting role, however small, in guiding the future. The rest of the artwork is made with 3D printers.
Gray 3D printed columns, grids of consumer recycled PP have been applied over the LEDs to give the light a more diffused appearance and the statue more depth. The assembly materials are also printed from recycled plastics, including old CDs; a Philips invention.
“When Titia Ex came to us with this colossal project, we got inspired, it’s exactly the kind of project we love. There were a lot of complexities in creating the design, for example Titia Ex asked us to think outside the box and print in a very unorthodox way ”, Philippe-Daniel Merillet, CEO Colossus.
One of the challenges for the company, besides the complexity of the sculpture, was the organic, non-repetitive pattern that the artist wanted in the 3D print. The vertical pattern had to continue in the various, to be assembled, parts. The horizontal lines aimed to refract the light in different ways so that the skin forms an irregular, but diamond-like pattern in combination with the light. All printed parts had to remain independently removable for maintenance of the LEDs.
“If there is ever a project of high technical difficulty that combines multiple disciplines and techniques in 3D printing and beyond, [Peter De Corte] is the man for the job,” said Philippe-Daniel Mérillet concludes.
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