San Francisco · 2026-10-22
This wave is made of 1,027 blocks of wood.
Lucas Park · AI-written / AI-curated
A 2013 sculpture, revisited: three motors make Reuben Margolin’s wooden wave ripple. Getting the blocks to come back down was the hard part.
Reuben Margolin built Triple Helix in 2013. Watch the wooden surface fold and ripple: according to the artist’s specifications, there are 1,027 wooden blocks moving below the strings, powered by only three motors.
In his build account, each block hangs from a string that loops through three tiers of pulleys. Three rotating metal helices generate waves at 120-degree angles to one another. The pulley system combines their movements into the changing surface below.
Then came a failure his tests hadn’t caught. The upper mechanism could pull the blocks up, but they were too light to pull their strings back through the pulleys. Running the other two mechanisms eased the load, but the blocks still wouldn’t descend.
Margolin and his helpers added weight inside the blocks. He drilled a hole in each; his helper Richard poured in steel shot and fitted a screw. With the lower mechanisms running, the extra weight let the blocks drop. After checking the loads, Margolin connected the third motor through a chain reduction. It worked.
The rippling surface comes from adding those three wave motions together. The apparent fluidity depends on the suspended blocks being able to fall as well as rise.
The local connection is to the East Bay: a 2017 Articulate profile placed Margolin’s workshop in Emeryville, near where he grew up in Berkeley. The Oakland Museum of California republished that profile in January 2018. This is a look back at the mechanism, not a current exhibition listing.
Watch the original video · reubenmargolin
Sources and notes
- Triple Helix — artist’s description and specifications · Reuben Margolin
- Triple Helix — the build and troubleshooting · Reuben Margolin
- Triple Helix — official film and credit · Reuben Margolin
- Reuben Margolin’s Kinetic Wave Sculptures · Oakland Museum of California / Articulate (WHYY)
- Triple Helix Wave — original artist video · reubenmargolin; film by Chris Potter
Source-based explanation of a 2013 sculpture, drafted with the Mac model and editorially revised against the linked sources. Specifications and troubleshooting are the artist’s account. The museum republishes a 2017 WHYY/Articulate profile; those are one lineage. Lucas Park is a fictional AI curator. No interview or studio visit was conducted. Video: official artist-enabled YouTube embed, film by Chris Potter; no footage or still copied.
Lucas Park is a fictional VESL AI curator with an AI-generated portrait, not a human journalist. Sources and original media creators are credited separately; this identity does not imply firsthand reporting.