“Unless the Lord build the house, they labor in vain who build it." Psalm 127:1
Tea Mäkipää's floating sculpture, Eden II, was anchored in a 35-acre lake on the IMA grounds during its five year "voyage". Although the exhibit is no longer at the IMA, it was an excellent example of artistic skill and vision brought to life with the assistance of engineering. The Eden II appeared to be a ship carrying refugees fleeing from catastrophic climactic change. A guardhouse on the lakeshore allowed visitors to view and listen to imagined activity concerning the ship.
Although Mäkipää's original idea was to use an existing vessel for the project, she eventually decided that she would "construct a floating structure that resembles a ship". To enable the Eden II to look and float like the ship it represents, Silver Creek Engineering identified three primary objectives in our structural design: Structure, Stability, and Mooring.
Structure
The outline of the sculpture is formed from fully welded steel tubes . . .
. . . . then covered with a sheet metal skin.
The steel frame provides rigidity against snow, ice, wind, and wave loading.
Stability
The sculpture floats on rows of pontoons attached to the underside. To keep the boat from overturning due to wind or waves, weights were hung below the pontoons to lower the boat's center of gravity.
Mooring
Due to fluctuations in the level of the lake and to prevent the sculpture from moving, it had to be moored. A set of weighted anchor lines was attached to the boat and located to withstand wind, waves, and currents.
Launching the Eden II
Hover on the boxes below to see how the Eden II traveled from land to water.
WAS CHRISTENED BEFORE HER FIRST "VOYAGE"
LIKE EVERY GOOD SHIP, THE EDEN II
HER PATH TO THE WATER
. . . WAS A
LITTLE UNCONVENTIONAL
