Material Library (this research report is still in progress.)

• over the 5 years of project production, workshops, material exhibition visits, constant interest and search for new (smart or active) materials, personal interest in experimenting with different textiles, foam made large collection of different material samples and together with it - knowledge about them qualities, suppliers, industries.

till now, all this information was in very scattered and difficult format for the comfortable reach and use for the foam team.

• another reason, why i started looking at how to systematize all that information, is quiet big interest from local and international artist, who more and more coming to foam (or contacting us by email) with the questions about one or other materials, qualities, methods of using, asking where to buy it, or sometimes just wanting to brainstorm, get inspiration from our experience.

• new, smart/active materials

the aim of this research project is to create place (library: physical and on-line), where people could find information, look, create, discover, enjoy, exchange and add.

• Create a physical library where you could find.:

information about materials /technical qualities/industries/

inspiration for new ideas

special section for smart and active materials

samples of materials, systems, structures made(or discovered) during workshops/ experiments

materials which can't be made in large amounts or even repeated.

to create possibility for artists, designers to place there own samples of materials

to make a network with other non profit material libraries in order to share information

• Create on-line database for materials:

there you should be able to fined technical information about materials, manufactures (if it has), possible connections to the projects(if it has)

• To make a on-line survey on material libraries.

Material Library

• visiting material libraries in different countries.
• visiting companies who has libraries only for internal use
• talking to founders or contact people of the material libraries
• analysing on-line lib. systems.
• creating questionnaire, in order to fined differences and similarities between material libraries and learn what could be useful for foam library
• consulting with librearins on different methods of lib. systems

• in 2006 i visited 3 physical libraries:

MateriO http://www.materio.fr/ Merkx and Girod http://www.merkx-girod.nl Material Connexion http://www.materialconnexion.com

* there i talked to responsible people about them aims, library systems, how it works. and did the same research on on-line libraries, such as: materia as Material Explorer http://materia.nl/ ReMaterialise

http://www.kingston.ac.uk/~kx19789/rematerialise/html_and_flash/R3aboutuspage.htm

• using questionnaire (Questions For Libraries), i made a survey on libraries physical and on-line systems: Material Library

• following detailed analysis of mentioned libraries i was looking at how to use this information for Foam Lib., what would be useful to learn and to adapt.
• in the end on 2006, based on that information, i started, material classification on samples,information sheets, catalogues: all what is in one or another way is connected to material/textile subject.
• I had a help from Belgium librarian, Karen Vanhercke, from Leuven

• comparison of the expected and the actual results
• suggestions and comments on the research process and its results
• description and suggestions around the collaboration process (if applicable)
• suggestions for the future work based on the conclusions of the research
• comments on the response of the public (if applicable)

• literature used in the research (books, magazines, journals, URLs…)
• media used in the research (film, audiovisual media, photographs…)
• visual/sonic/tactile material generated in the research to be archived at FoAM