Back to Snelson's Planar Pieces
To: Kenneth Snelson
Date: Tue, 05 Oct 2004 11:23:51 -0400
Subject: tensegrity truss
Hi Ken,
A thesis by Val Gomez reminds me that you have worked on tensegrity trusses. It seems to me that I saw a photo somewhere of a truss you'd designed which looked like one that I've put together, but I've been unable to find it again. My design is documented at https://bobwb.tripod.com/prospect/prospect.htm#Tripods and also at https://bobwb.tripod.com/tenseg/book/appendixA.html (Figure A.2)
If they are the same design I'd like to mention your previous work and document it and I'd be curious about your experience with it. If you have an electronic copy of a photo of the truss that would be helpful as well as any publically available reference where it can be found.
I also take it that you do not think this sculpture that Karl Iocabson put together way back when, a purported reconstruction of which was displayed at the Guggenheim, was a tensegrity 3-prism. I haven't looked closely at the photograph this claim is based on, so it's hard for me to say. If it's not a t-prism, I wonder what it was. I certainly understand your claim that the reconstructor may have read current technology into something in the past where that technology wasn't present.
I thank you for any time you can devote to these matters.
Bob Burkhardt