Yellow Band: By Land, Week 1

Wait a minute, it's only been a week? The rock makes past the office, almost to our Thursday goal of the top of the entryway steps. This may be the Tinkering School in me talking, but I really love the way things click for kids when the scale of a question is turned way up. So, for several weeks, I've been thinking about the enormous things that humans move around the world. Not enormous amounts of things (yet), but rather things that are massive, heavy, take up a lot of space.Like Stonehenge, or those big trees in Mendocino. So, we started this week pondering how people long ago moved things that are just so huge. Our initial ideas were pretty simple, concrete. But, I chose a big heavy rock specifically because it would not work for all of us to carry it. Not to mention that all of our hands and bodies don't even fit around the rock! Rock relocation, day 1. This idea must have really gelled with the kiddos in the Beehive, because when we introduced our next building projects, many proposed that we use wheels to make something that would allow a kid to lift another kid. This led to some great explorations around simple machines (with some help from Bill Nye), not to mention enriching our ongoing discussions about how to move that darn rock. All three of these children are integral to installing that pulley. Kiddos knew that wheels would be very helpful to move the rock, but one suggested that we shouldn't use casters to build a cart because the ancient Britons that built Stonehenge would not have had wheels (that was a freeby!). Luckily, another Yellow Bander suggested that we use some type of cylinder, so we headed to the shop to see what we could find. Answer: PVC.When Day 2 of rock relocation got underway, after a reminder to make sure to use ready calls before lifting the rock (ouch...), we managed to move the rock a grand total of about 16 inches--off the stage and onto the cork floor. It took so much teamwork, patience and sticktoitiveness, and then we were pooped. Rock relocation, day 2. Off the stage, onto the cork floor. Phew. After all of that effort, we took a break to watch a short video explaining the point of all this. Humans move enormous things by land all the time. Along the way, they encounter loads of problems to solve and the persevere so that they can get the thing to where it's going.Joe Vilardi of BudCo Enterprises is one of those people. You may have noticed him in that video, working on the installation of Sequence at the SFMOMA. I reached out to him weeks ago, hoping for the kiddos to have some type of interaction with this expert rigger. And he was down! Thanks Joe!So, on Thursday, we moved the rock as far as we could--which happened to be the top of the entryway stairs.[embed]https://www.instagram.com/p/BME3ryyAViY/?hl=en[/embed]Then, on Friday morning, we went to SFMOMA to see the Sequence in person--feel the scale of such an undertaking--and write questions for Joe. "What's the heaviest thing you've ever moved?" "How did you separate the segments of the sculpture?" "How did you develop your plan for moving the sculpture?" You can see more photos of this week in the flickr album!

brightworksPiper AlldredgeOctober 28, 20161920 Bryant St-, arc:by land, Brightworks Beehive, SF Brightworks, Yellow Band