KSW and the Steampunk Tree House

Kinetic Steam Works (KSW) is a U.S. West Coast art collective. Co founder Sean Orlando discusses in depth the workings of the collective and his collaboration with KSW on the Steampunk Tree House.

Steampunk is defined by some as a reaction against the disposable plastic culture others see it purely as an aesthetic movement, in fact its definition is a cause of constant debate, how do you see KSW in relation to your perception of Steampunk?

Steampunk's come a long way from the mid-eighties Homunculus Movement, wherein it was a mostly literary concern, which seemed wholly "of the past" and neat in a "what if" alternate history sort of way. In the past few years Steampunk's really taken off as a social-movement with its own early culture, sensibility, dress, and politics. There are steampunk rock bands, club nights, restaurants, fancy dress balls, zines, and weird industrial art groups.

People (especially in America) still experience the thought of Steam power as archaic, terribly nostalgic and Romantic. Steam recalls a simpler, more benign past. This slight of hand is of course that this past never really existed and it certainly didn't exist in the lifetimes of most people. Given actual history, it seems like a form of aspirational ancestor worship. People also don't know that most of their power is still produced with steam turning a turbine, spinning a generator. The water still must be heated with coal, natural gas, or nuclear power.

There's a great c. 1831 lithograph titled, "The Advent of Steam ," it depicts a really busy London thoroughfare populated by outlandish steam driven cars and buses, carrying astonished passengers. There are plumes of coal smoke pouring from these contraptions and skinny, asthmatic dogs suffering by the wayside, having been Subdued by Progress. The cartoon's an early example of the nightmare of mass engine ownership and the subsequent pollution it caused. 17 years later it was reported that England's light coloured "peppered moths," having undergone natural selection, were now into dark versions of themselves, to better blend in with the soot.

As a whole, steam power's been incredibly destructive and... generative. One of KSW's first restorations was a 1920 J.I. Case traction engine (a steam powered farm tractor). From the 1850’s onward engines like it made the colonization and industrial farming of America and Canada possible. Which is great unless... you were on that usurped land first. The point we're making is that the history of steam power's been a mixed bag. For KSW, this consciousness tends to limit its ahistorical nostalgic influence.

We finally seem to be at a collective moment where there's no question that the petroleum status quo's unsustainable politically and environmentally. Global warming and scarce resources are becoming a reality for people. It feels like there's more of a political will to do something. Even Detroit is giving lip service to "post-gasoline" cars! People are looking for alternates that they have control over. Bio-diesel movements, electric car moding, backyard wind and solar power, bikes, alt-energy, these things are now sexy. And so too is Steampunk, it's the romantic imaginary past that came before car culture. It grounds the present, it shows another way (even if it didn't quite exist) that a better future can be based on. KSW also thinks that the Steampunk narrative is an ongoing cautionary tale.

Within the collective there are artists from diverse backgrounds and interests. What do you think draws so many to the power of steam?

On the West Coast of America, industrial artists people have been working their way through the various elements, fire was big for many years, now it's steam. Steam, it's the new fire. It's new, really new, artists dig novelty. The enormous steam engine! It's a T-rex, a gearhead's dream, it's got history, and jets of fire. It's earthy and organic, rhythmic like a heartbeat.

What was the initial reason for setting up Kinetic Steam Works?

Many of us have gladly worked on other people's amazing large-scale art projects over the years and we wanted to work on our own projects, together. Collaboration is a big ethos in the Bay Area industrial arts community, it's as much about the social bonds as the creative output, so founding a collective seemed natural. We were all bored with anonymity of electric power and the ubiquity of gasoline. We choose steam because we could all agreed that we wanted to do it, no one else was, and that it was both a challenge and severely under-explored as a medium and arts technology. It's also too big an undertaking for anything short of a collective.

K.S.W. runs various workshops. If someone were to attend, what might they expect to learn and or build?

We pair new people up with an experienced person and we teach the routine tasks of basic engine maintenance (sweeping out the fire box, removing boiler plugs, greasing, oiling, etc.), while imparting basic steam engine nomenclature. If there's a less frequent or ongoing project, we break it up into pieces and get to work. So, one week you might learn how to take apart/rebuild a 100-year-old oiling mechanism, re-pack the main piston with graphite impregnated square braided rope, learn about the engine's dynamo and wiring system, or remove and restore the eccentric shaft. For the mechanical stuff, if someone's really interested we recommend the basic steam course operated by the Roots of Motive Power. They're a non-profit organization located in Willits, CA dedicated to preserving steam power know-how and the historical treasure's of California's steam history (RR, logging, mining). If we're going to fire the engine up, someone will learn the start up procedures and ultimately how to safely operate the engine. There's a lot to learn, but not so much that there isn't usually something for everyone to do, no matter the experience or skill level.

We also have planning meetings where we brainstorm about art and steam power. You should expect beer (the darker the better), sketches, schematics, newly machined parts, kinetic art models, wild gesticulating, and moustaches (loaners provided, wax is not).

You previously mentioned KSW’s 1920 Case Traction Engine. Where did you find her and how much restoration and modification did she undergo before she was fit for service?

We found "Hortense" in Carson City, NV. We bought her from an older steam geek that used to work in the RR industry. The engine had been in storage under a tarp for 20 years and came with its own bus-sized hay-bailer! The former owner, the engine's second, was at a point in his life where keeping a traction engine in storage no longer made sense and he was thrilled (surprised even) that a new generation wanted to learn about and use steam.

When you're looking to buy a steam engine of any kind, the number one thing is the boiler. It all comes down to it in terms of safety and money. Luckily, the engine's owner had taken very good care of "Hortense" and the boiler was sound. In fact, a pre-condition to the sale was that it pass Nevada's boiler inspection tests and be officially certified by the State, which it was. Had it not passed, a new or refurbished certified boiler would have been prohibitively expensive. That having been said, it wasn't all steam and skittles. It hadn't been run in two decades, it needed a lot of work, and re-machining, parts had worn from time and 70 years of use. Beyond getting her shipshape, we re-did the electrical system which runs off of a steam powered dynamo. Greg Jones, one of the principal engineers of KSW and mastermind behind La Contessa (an authentic spanish galleon built for Burning Man 2002), designed and built from scratch a gorgeous steampunk art-nouveau canopy that he plumbed with propane jets, re-painted, etc. Thinking back, it was a ton of work along with learning how to operate the engine!

Running such an engine requires certain skills and knowledge that I would imagine are hard to come by. Does everyone know how to run and maintain her or do you have a specialized crew?

Yes. 90% of the steam guys (and they are guys) I run into are in their 70's+. When they get past KSW's artist-weirdo factor and figure out that we're genuinely interested in steam power and machinery, they warm up and enthusiastically impart what they know.

One of our founders had volunteered on a still running WW II era steam powered liberty ship (still docked in SF and open to the public), so one of us had some direct experience with running a steam powered something. We had a lot of help from the engine's former owner and of course we were able to learn a lot from the previously mention folks at the Roots of Motive power. Many of us are also mechanically inclined, artist-engineers so it was possible to pick it up by doing and reading about it (there are still manuals for how to maintain, repair, and operate a 1920 J.I. Case). Later on we began to encounter other communities doing things with steam, especially the Sacramento Delta steam boaters, and were able to pick the collective steam geek brain.

Everyone is in a constant state of learning. Several of us know a lot, enough to run the engine safely and teach others how. We don't quite have "engine firing" merit badges, but there are specific sets of learned skills. By default we have specialized crews, but they're not exclusive, if you want to learn how to do something, we'll teach you! And we like to rotate people in/out of various rolls/tasks so everyone will eventually know everything.

The 'Steampunk Tree House' made its debut at Burning Man this year it seems to be a very sedate construction compared to others at the festival. Can you tell us more about it, how long did it take to construct, did you have Calliope recitals?

I conceived of the Steampunk Tree House early on as a possible large scale installation piece for Burning Man 2007. As one of the founders of Kinetic Steam Works, I became more and more interested and enamoured with steam driven technology and how it relates to kinetic art & sculpture. My intention was to create a playful, mysterious and otherworldly environment that inspired and motivated people to re-examine the patterns and models that have been constructed within our social, personal, and environmental realities. Burning Man approved my proposal and I assembled a crew of over 50 artists, engineers, scientists, computer geeks and designers who all worked on a volunteer basis to construct this sculpture in just over 3 months. My friend Steve Valdez stepped up as a major player in its construction and volunteered to design and fabricate the entire branch structure and to engineer it's method of assembly. Steve and I loosely talked about the intention and particular design aesthetic that we were looking to achieve and made some rough sketches, but the branches were mostly designed and conceived of straight out of Steve's imagination and ingenuity.

David Shulman, Christopher Palmer and Bena Currin designed the lighting.

Jamie Vaida designed the balconies.

Nathaniel Taylor designed the steam calliope.

Max Chen designed the vulture, dumb waiter and spy glass.

Torreya Cummings, Alan Rorie, Ben Carpenter, Ake Grunditz and Leslie Grunditz created most of the house's interior artistic elements along with Martin Sweet, Bree Hylkema, Rachel Riggin, Spy Emerson, Jo Slota, Grant Diffendaffer and Kirsten Anderson.

Kinetic Steam Works provided the steam.

There are too many people to fully list but the point is that it was a major collaborative effort.

It was phenomenal to watch as people interacted and played with it. Guests at the main door were encouraged to turn off their blinky lights, hide their glow sticks and tuck away any "unnatural" source of "glowy device" so that they might better appreciate the mood and environment of the house. It was a very interactive piece. Most of the Burning Man head staff went out of their way to visit it on a regular basis. Stinky Pirate, a crew member of Burning Man's DPW, played an integral part in helping us with heavy equipment during the install. He apparently became so inspired by the piece that he took it upon himself to make an artistic contribution to the front door lighting device. Steven Raspa came back many times and Larry Harvey got a personal tour from me on the Friday before the burn.

From design through construction the Tree House took around 6 months to build. Three months of design work, and 3 months actually building the sculpture (and we worked down to the wire). We never had time to have official calliope recitals. The first time we put steam to the whistles, and actually the first time the Tree House was fully assembled in its entirety, was up on the Playa.

We are currently looking for a permanent home for the Steampunk Tree House. Many other ideas have come out of this project and many new artistic collaborations have been forged.

Sean, 2007 was your 2nd year at Burning Man with KSW. How did it compare to your first visit to the Playa?

This was personally actually my 5th year at Burning Man. 2002 Floating World was my first year and it still stands out as one of my favourite years... partially because I got to watch La Contessa get built that year. I attended Burning Man 06 with Kinetic Steam Works, which was the first year we brought steam power to the Playa, but we did not get funding for that year. The Steampunk Tree House was the first large scale art installation that I had done for the 07 Burning Man event, which was partially funded by their grant program. What they call, an "Honorarium Artist"...

It's always a really fantastic experience to contribute to the event in such a substantial way. Everyone who worked on the project became Rock Stars for a week.

So when did your personal fascination with steam and its use in art begin?

I've been an artist since I can barely remember. Zach introduced me to steam and steam power. In the early conceptual days of Kinetic Steam Works when Zach and I would sit around and talk about how to define and establish what we were doing, my thoughts were always on the artistic side of our Mission Statement. The engineering and operations and technical side of steam is really fascinating... live steam and the reality of the technology is really sexy and attractive, but I'm primarily interested in what we can do with it artistically and what kinds of things we can power.

When Jamie Vaida presented the idea of a steam powered carousel, the first task that we undertook was to design and fabricate a Power Take-Off (PTO) device that would allow us to transfer the power from the steam engine to the carousel through a series of fly-wheels, gears, slip-clutches and drive shafts. We affectionately refer to this PTO as "The Dingus". The "Goes Around Comes Around" was fabricated from scratch by Jamie Vaida and crew and we gave people rides at both Burning Man 06, Coachella & Stagecoach. KSW's intention has also been to collaborate with kinetic artists and artists in general. Jamie was the first collaboration and the Tree House project that I conceived of was the next. Since then we have established partnerships and collaborations with many other artists including, Ryon Gesink and Alan Rorie.

So what's next for Kinetic Steam Works?

Keep in mind that our main mission is to combine steam power with kinetic art. Our main engine weighs 18,000lbs. (8,165kg). Transporting is an expensive proposition and overkill for many smaller projects. So, one of the things we're working on is acquiring and converting much smaller, more portable engines to run off of sprayed fuels, like bio diesel or, renewable solid fuels like naturally beach deceased seals (they're very fatty). Overall we plan to do more collaboration with other artists in 2008 and introducing steam to art, art to steam. People are still a bit unfamiliar with what we have to offer. One of our longer term projects may be a steam lorry that would do Verne and Wells proud.

If you want to get involved with KSW or just want to see what kind of things they have in their boilers check out the following…

The Steampunk Tree House

Kinetic Steam Works.org

Photographs for this interview kindly supplied by: Tristan Savatier (playa-dust.com)