Art in/of Nature by Archineer

2020

Art in/

Sabah Shawkat © Sabah Shawkat

/of Nature

“We believe that our team archineer is only that strong how people support us.

Sabah Shawkat © For this reason, we surround ourselves with creative individuals dedicated to innovation and excellence.”

CONTENTS

TABLE OF

Sabah Shawkat © 8-57 TENSILE - INTEGRITY STRUCTURES

58-75 LIGHTWEIGHT STRUCTURE AS SCULPTURE 76-85 TENSEGRITY AS PEDESTRIAN BRIDGES 86-107 GRID SHELLS 108-115 GEODESIC DOME 116-151 RECIPROCAL FRAMES 152-193 EXHIBITIONS 194-209 MODELLING PROCESS

Reviewer: Cover Design: Editor: Software Support: Technological Support: Publisher: Printed and Bound:

Ivan Petelen, Sami E Khosnaw Tamara Širin Shawkatová Richard Schlesinger asc. Applied Software Consultants, s.r.o., Bratislava, Slovakia Marek Vaško, Matej Pospíšil Tribun EU, s.r.o. Cejl 892/32, 60200 Brno, Czech Republic Tribun EU, s.r.o., Brno, Czech Republic

Publishing of this book was financially supported by the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic ( KEGA 002VŠVU-4/2019) for the purpose of participation at the exhibition “TIME SPACE EXISTENCE Design & Innovation section” organized and hosted by the European Cultural Centre in Venice, Italy

Sabah Shawkat ©

Art in /of Nature ©

Sabah Shawkat 2nd. Edition, Tribun EU, s.r.o. Brno, Czech Republic ISBN 978-80-263-1570-4

About author Sabah Shawkat is a structural designer, specializing in lightweight structures, such as tensile structures, tensile integrity structures, grid shells and reciprocal frames. He focuses on transforming these beautiful structures into design components such as chairs, tables, illuminated lamps or hammocks for interiors, gardens or public spaces.

Sabah Shawkat ©

Sabah Shawkat is also a passionate expert in traditional fibre reinforced and prestressed structures. He has published numerous articles in professional journals and has written several books. He teaches students of architecture and building engineering. Moreover, he regularly organizes workshops for students and exhibitions of his own as well as student projects and construction models. He is also actively involved in projecting and building constructions as well as reconstructions and modernizations of buildings.

Foreword The architectural discourse, which followed the path of sophisticated philosophy, is increasingly moving away from the simple constructing that gave birth to building and architecture. However, constructing, experimenting with its principles and searching for new structural solutions has not lost its meaning at all. The author of this book proves to us that structural geometry is an area in which an almost infinite number of discoveries is still possible. Like the father of similar experiments, Richard Buckminster Fuller, also Sabah Shawkat is not only engaged in theoretical geometry, but he is constantly testing his models at halfway point to realization. With admirable toughness, he benefits from the wealth of spatial combination of elemental geometric structures - a simple composition of line patterns. Later he continues his investigation, getting to the real tension and compression elements and experimenting to create their complex equilibrium. Light metal strips, rods, ropes, subtle tubes, and wooden prisms are the materials on which he demonstrates his creative variation, alternation and experimentation. Due to this endless quest, he has managed to arouse sincere enthusiasm among his students.

Sabah Shawkat ©

Prof. Ing. arch. Matúš Dulla, DrSc.

Lightweight structures used in various forms and variations can be seen in a broad spectrum of use. They may be of different shapes and sizes, internal, external, permanent, temporary, large, small, supported, membranes filled with air or stretched. These structures, developed over the years, together with advances in material engineering and technology, continue to progress and are now an integral part of architectural creation. These unique forms have played an important role in contemporary architecture, interior design and various cultural events since the time they first appeared in the 1960s in Germany. At present, light constructions are designed and constructed independently of the geographic location. They have the ability to transform the space by their elegant form. Designing lightweight constructions to meet all criteria is a complex task. Every part is visible and constructive, relying on the proper functioning of all parts.

Our Archineer Team hopes that the current book will give you a better idea of designing lightweight structures and presenting them as art. The author is grateful for the financial support from the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic ( KEGA 002VŠVU-4/2019), which enabled the publication of this book for the purpose of the exhibition “TIME SPACE EXISTENCE - Design and Innovation Section” organized and hosted by the European Cultural Centre in Venice, Italy.

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Architects and engineers are the creators of new spaces, forms and structures that are constantly improving. This creative activity connects architects and engineers on their way to the art of the world-famous German architect and structural engineer Frei Otto.

Sabah Shawkat

Tensile - Integrity Structures

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The early development of tensegrity was already known by many professionals for many years. I have a knowledge that the Latvian artist Karl Loganson made an exhibition in 1920-21 about the prisms of tensegrity in the capital city of Russia according to many historians who preoccupy themselves with this type of art. The word “tensegrity” (a contraction of “tensileintegrity”) was coined by the American entrepreneur Buckminster Fuller.

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The members of a tensegrity structure are either always in tension or always in compression. The tensile members are usually cables or rods, while the compression members are strut sections. All tensegrities are prestressed under tension; they are self–supporting and independent of gravity. But the weight of the structure also adds to the prestress. All components are dynamically linked such that forces are translated instantly everywhere; a change in one part is reflected throughout the whole structure.

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Lightweight Structure as Sculpture

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Our team of structural designers archineer started to deal with this kind of fine art of structure in the year 2008. Together we try to bring fresh ideas into the field and create different models of tensegrities. In this chapter could be found various model used for living and for pleasure as furniture, table lamps or toys. We pay attention not only to the structure itself, but also to details, aesthetic and the elegance of the models. In my experience it is important for design, first to get basic knowledge about characteristic and optimum use of materials. They should get familiar with new technologies, modern manufacturing equipment and working procedures of construction members.

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Each node of the structures is connected by two horizontal cables within its own horizontal plane, and is connected by one vertical cable and one strut to nodes in the other plane. The thick and thin lines denote, respectively, cables that can only carry tension, and struts that carry compression. These structures are called super stable.

The

tensile

members

are

continuously

connected to each other and to the ends of the compression members while the compression members are only connected to tensile members and not to other compression members.

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Tensegrity as Pedestrian Bridges

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The potential of lightweight structures in the future for designers is very significant, so the tensile integrity structure as it is called tensegrity is of great importance for construction under tension. And that is why we were dealing with parametric models in this section that we expressed the benefits of this system for pedestrian bridges.

In general, a tensile structure is type of construction involving the use of elements on with tensional forces are implied, with no compressive forces action, or bending, giving it great construction advantages. That is the quality that offers possibilities of large spanning and utilizing a variety of free standing forms. We attempt to create light and slender structures quickly set a high standard for structural design. Steel, and prestressed concrete, enabled us to embody the lightweight ideal in structural design.

This type of parametric bridges is a wonderful example of this. The structural system of the cablestayed bridge or suspension bridge is well suited to this desire, by decreasing the distance between the cable supports, the deck can be made slenderer as the bending moments are reduced. Therefore, the structural designer greatest goal is always to make the deck as slender as possible, because at the end its design will be elegant and aesthetically pleasing. Cable supported bridges, which can be built in a great variety of forms and with considerable elegance, have undisputed potential.

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Grid Shells

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Geodesic Dome

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Fuller’s primary interest was adapting the technology to the development of spherical and domical structures with architectural applications in mind. He also used tensegrity structures to make some philosophical points. As an architect, Emmerich was also interested in architectural applications and designed at least one dome as well.

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An early exception to this dearth of information on tensegrity calculating was Hugh Kenner’s excellent work Geodesic Math which went into an exact technique for the very simple tensegrity prism and outlined an approximate technique for dealing with some simple spherical structures.

These domes could encompass very large

areas with only minimal support at their perimeters. In a spherical configuration, tensegrity designs could be useful in an outer-space context as superstructures for space stations.

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Reciprocal Frames

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One of the extremely popular architectural forms of contemporary architecture and design represent the reciprocal structures. They make impression especially by their innovative design, unique shape and great flexibility. Compared to traditional rigid structures they allow larger spans with minimal number of support members. Reciprocal structure has always enjoyed great interest of architects and structural designers. The models are produced as physical miniatures of the static - structural system with large spans. The advantage of such models versus virtual 3D models is the possibility to directly verify the structural scheme. Designers can thus check the functionality of their bearing concepts apply them in practice when designing various architectural structures.

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Exhibition at the Faculty of Architecture STU in Bratislava 2020

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Sabah Shawkat 2nd. Edition, Tribun EU, s.r.o. Brno, Czech Republic ISBN 978-80-263-1570-4