Yellowknife to get 3D treatment
Gen-X author Douglas Coupland creating portraits of residents for national art project
Kirsten Fenn
Northern News Services
Friday, March 31, 2017
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Canadian artist and author Douglas Coupland is coming to town and he wants to make 3D models of Yellowknifers for his latest project.
Douglas Coupland, left, makes a scan of Simons clothing franchise CEO Peter Simons. - photos courtesy of Simons |
Residents are invited to stop by the Racquet Club on Monday night between 3 and 8 p.m. to get their faces scanned by an iPad so Coupland can then bring them to life using a 3D printer.
It's all part of 3D Canada, "a cross-country, crowd-sourced project" that will result in a 3D portrait of 2,017 people from around Canada, according to Angela Stinson, director of store development for Simons.
The idea for the artwork came about in 2015 when fashion retailer Simons commissioned Coupland to create a sculpture for its Vancouver store.
Together, Stinson and CEO Peter Simons made several trips to Coupland's studio in Vancouver where he was working away on ideas.
"On one of the visits, before we started our meeting, he turned to Peter and asked whether he'd like to get scanned," Stinson said, although she admits the two had no idea what that meant at the time.
"So he scanned us in 3D and he actually had a 3D printer in his studio. That was our first real exposure to 3D printing," she told Yellowknifer.
The interaction sparked an idea to expand the commissioned artwork beyond Vancouver to create 3D portraits of people at six Simons stores across Canada.
Coupland is now making stops in nine different cities - Quebec City, Montreal, Edmonton, Vancouver, Ottawa, Mississauga, Calgary, Yellowknife and Halifax - to scan people's faces and transform their 3D-printed portraits into a large-scale installation.
"It's a pretty monumental sculpture," said Stinson, referencing some of the designs she has seen.
"We're still trying to find its final home, but it will go into a Simons store in the future."
The piece is expected to be completed and unveiled to the public this year.
"Part of this is also to speak to Canada 150," Stinson said.
"We realized that each city is diverse ... but we really felt that we were missing the territories - the North - and that we were missing the East Coast."
The group deliberately decided to add Yellowknife to the list of pit stops to help fill that void.
While Yellowknife can't capture all the diversity of the North, Stinson said, she added it seemed like a "good fit."
About 100 people will get a chance to be scanned on Monday when Coupland lands in town.
A technician will circle participants for about 30 seconds, capturing their data with an iPad.
Coupland will then print a few of the 3D portraits on site.
That part, however, takes a bit longer - about half an hour to be exact.
Stinson told Yellowknifer Coupland will print the remaining portraits back in Vancouver and mail them to Yellowknife participants at a later date.
She added that she thinks Coupland's use of technology in his work is cutting edge.
"I think this is a really great example of it," said Stinson.
