There is a bit of a Renaissance feel to "Motion Science" at 21_21 Design Sight. Consciously compounding science, technology, art and design for the greater good of promoting curiosity and discovery in general, the exhibition is targeted at children and students. Automated devices and installations whirl, puff, jiggle and flash in architect Tadao Ando's minimalist concrete space, and for the most part they echo his war on color by being either white, or black and white. The overall effect is that the exhibition is playful, but in a slightly po-faced manner.
In the center of the main hall there is a tower of cardboard boxes that booms loudly from the cumulative effect of 126 small rhythmic taps, elsewhere a robotic apparatus morphs visitors' handwritten messages into drawings, and there are spinning parasols whose patterns become animation under strobe lighting.
The megalomaniacally minded can command an array of robotic stalks to follow their movements in the installation "Hill of Reign," and you can levitate polystyrene foam balls on gusts of air. There are a few archive-based exhibits, too, but sadly no orreries, automata or pendulums.
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.