Theo Jansen is a visual artist from the Netherlands that created clever moving sculptures, and his working-series is called “Strandbeests”, that means “beach animals” in Dutch.
The disconcertingly realistic ‘Strandbeests’ appear to walk, crawl and slug their way across the coastlines of Holland, replicating animal and critter movements in mesmerizing fashion. Jansen’s legendary wind-walking project has occupied almost 30 years of his career, inspiring the likes of NASA to develop ingenious technology nimble enough to withstand missions to Venus. Starting in 1990, the artist experimented with mechanical engineering techniques to craft skeletons out of plastic tubes, developing each animal’s leg system with an impressive scientific formula. Each beast has a stomach which acts as a control center or brain, feeding on kinetic wind energy to gather speed in what can only be described as a bewilderingly animal-like motion.
