Collaborations
GEORGE L.LEGENDRE BArch MA Harvard ARB, Associate Professor in practice Harvard GSD Boston USA,
John Pickering started his first collaboration with the architect George Legendre in 2002 which continued to the very end of John's life and beyond.
After seeing John Pickering’s work exhibited at the Architectural Association in Bedford Square, London in 2002 George approached him with the idea of collaborating on a project exploring the feasibility of producing a large scale computer generated piece. George Legendre’s architectural practice, IJP Corporation, specialised in the natural intersections of space, mathematics and computation and was therefore ideally suited to Pickering’s work.
Having worked together to identify the ideal sculpture, the artist’s original extensive calculations were used to draw a flat material pattern. The patterns were flat sheet laser cut and the sculpture finally pieced together. This process would be exactly the same as the one to be employed in the manufacture of a large piece involving consulting civil constructional engineers.
The first model was produced in 2005 and subsequently two other sculptures have been made using the same method. This collaborative process has been both motivated and enriched by the strong empathy created between like minds.
FOSTER AND PARTNERS
In 2007 a collaboration was begun between Pickering and the Special Modelling Group at Foster and Partners at Riverside Three, Battersea, London.
Pickering chose various sections of his elaborate mathematics of inversion to be entered into the computer and thus, via the sophisticated 3D printer at Fosters, twelve small models were generated. These small models were then colour coded to illustrate the origin of the inversion.
The series of models were shown in an exhibition at Kettles Yard, Cambridge in April 2007.
