Flourish (Bloom)

Edmark’s 3-D printed sculptures, called blooms, animate when spun under a strobe light.

John Edmark’s 3-D printed sculptures, called blooms, are designed to animate when spun under a strobe light. The bloom’s animation effect is achieved by progressive rotations of the golden ratio, phi (ϕ), the same ratio that nature employs to generate the spiral patterns we see in pinecones and sunflowers. If you count the number of spirals on any part of the sculpture you will find that they correlate with Fibonacci numbers. The rotational speed and strobe rate of the bloom are synchronized so that one flash occurs every time the bloom turns 137.5º, the golden angle (the angular version of phi). Each bloom’s particular form and behavior is determined by a unique parametric seed that Edmark calls a phi-nome (/fī nōm/).