Tag: Cat Art

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Cathenge DC -In Proposal to the DC Commission on Arts and Humanities – July 2025

Would you like to see Cathenge installed as public art in SW DC?

Support artist David Normal’s goal of installing Cathenge in “Linear Park” the park in the roundabout at the terminus of Maryland Av. SW in DC SW, Ward 6.   

Cathenge DC is in proposal to the DC Commission on Art and Humanities for consideration in the “Public Art Building Communities”  grant program that awards funds annually for new public art throughout Washington DC.  The grant deadline is July 22nd 2025.

 As a 3D printed sculptural installation, Cathenge represents the leading edge of ambition for the artistic application of large format additive printing.  The sculptures are a multi-media fusion:  3D  printing, LED lighting, lasers, sound, vibration and electronic interactive sensing are integral to the effect and provide visitors with a direct and palpable experience of the mystical Space Cat consciousness.

Visitors to Cathenge experience the majesty of the Catoliths through their interactive sound and lights.  People moving within the circle of cat statues are detected by LiDAR beams.  Soft harmonic purring tones and synchronized pulsing lights are generated which respond directly to the movement.  These interactive light and sound effects evoke the power of Holofelinity.

 

Cathenge DC Visualization

 

Proposed Site of Cathenge: “Linear Park”, Maryland Ave. SW, Washington DC

 

The Catolith.  Mystic cat statue of the Ancient Space Cat.

 

Cathenge at Patricia’s Green, Hayes Valley, San Francisco

Currently, “Cathenge DC” is being proposed to the DC Commission on Arts and Humanities for their “Public Art Building Communities” (PABC) grant which provides funding for public art installations that foster and strengthen community throughout Washington DC.

Background:

Cathenge was on display for 16 months, from October 2022 to March 2024, in downtown San Francisco.   Sponsored by the San Francisco Arts Commission, it was displayed at the prestigious Patricia’s Green sculpture site in the fashionable Hayes Valley district of SF near the Davies Symphony Hall. 

Cathenge began as a Burning Man Foundation funded “Honorarium Project” that  was presented at the annual Burning Man arts festival in the Black Rock Desert of Northern Nevada.

“Cathenge DC” will be a newly revised and improved version of the recent SF installation that features great improvements in the sound and light interactivity of the installation the SF Standard called “Insanely Popular”.

Press:

“Cathenge” Glowing 9-Foot Tall Cat Sculptures Come to SF

https://sfstandard.com/2022/11/17/cathenge-comes-to-sf

https://www.timeout.com/usa/news/a-massive-cathenge-is-being-unveiled-in-san-francisco-with-glowing-feline-monoliths-112522

About the Artist:

David Normal is a painter, animator, and installation maker based in the SF Bay Area.  Normal got his start making fliers for the hardcore punk scene in the Bay Area in the mid-80s.  Normal began contributing to the Burning Man Festival in the mid ‘90s. Normal’s accomplishments were recognized in a solo exhibition of lightbox-murals at the British Library in
London in 2015, “Crossroads of Curiosity”. In 2022 he created “Cathenge”, the Cat Temple, for the San Francisco Arts Commission. This public art installation was displayed at Patricia’s Green Park in Hayes Valley, San Francisco from October of 2022 through March of 2024.  Currently David Normal has newly established a studio in West Oakland for producing 3D printed installation art.

@postnormalism
@cathenge_cat_temple
https://davidnormal.net
http://cathenge.net
http://crossroadsofcuriosity.org

More info about Cathenge can be found on the website:

About Cathenge

Note:  This proposal was begun in 2023, but couldn’t be completed in time for the 2023 grant cycle, so I am finishing it now, and hope to turn in the grant by the deadline on July 22nd 2024.

For the seriously interested:

Here is a link to the proposal draft underway.  You can learn all about Cathenge DC by reading the answer to the DC CAH questions:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQRdIu3gWpKOtPPx0exW2Ae90d5NWgEmwjifdXFEkIjRX1wOIcRgYtXHhFwvdnMkXLf0X0A0RlL8Upc/pub

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Miami Art Basel: David Normal’s Futuristic Installations

Documentary and Interview by Julia Schroeder

In December of 2023, I brought artwork to Art Basel Miami for the first time. It did not go unnoticed! Art historian and videomaker, Julia Schroeder, spotted it and approached me about doing a short video about my work. Over the Spring of 2024, we conducted a number of interviews and sifted through project documentation and last Friday, June 21st, the finished video popped up on the web.

It focuses on my adventure of bringing the Kittolith to Miami Art Week and displaying it in The Maze installation at Hotel Faena’s beachfront. Full story here.

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Kittoliths grow up to be Catoliths

Refurbished Catoliths with new bases and “KISS” (Kittolith Interactive Sound System) adapted to the Catolith

It’s only natural that cats should have kittens, and plastic cat statues should therefore have their progeny too. The Coven of Catoliths gave birth to a Litter of Kittoliths.

After 5 years of design and production I feel that the Catolith is at last nearing its potential. The newly refurbished Catoliths that were just installed at KALW with their LiDAR based interactivity, battery operation, independent control via Raspberry Pi computer, and lighter more mobile wooden base actually exceed what I imagined for this artwork 5 years ago.

Below is a table showing the progression of techniques from one iteration of Cathenge to the next.

Component
New Catolith (2024)		Kittolith System (2023-24)Catolith System (Patricia’s Green 2022)
Catolith System (BMan 2019)
InteractivityLiDAR (“Time of Flight”), Raspberry PiLiDAR (“Time of Flight”), Raspberry PiPassive InfraredCapacitive Sensing by Theremin Barney
PurringSolfeggio Tone BasedSolfeggio Tone BasedPurr Data interactive composition by Jacob TonskiPurr Tones by No.e
3D PrintingPETG/CR-10 S-5
Self-Printed		PETG/CR-10 S-5
Self-Printed		PETG/CR-10 S-5
Self-Printed		PLA by Titanic Design
3D Modeling“Voxel Modeling” for 2-ply model with “shiplap” joints.“Voxel Modeling” for 2-ply model with “shiplap” joints.“Voxel Modeling” for 2-ply model with “shiplap” joints.No joining system!
BaseWooden BaseWooden BaseConcrete BaseConcrete Base
SoundTransductive Speakers/Inverted Sub Mounted in the BaseTransductive Speakers/Inverted Sub Mounted in the BaseTransductive Speakers/Bazooka SubCar Audio Stuff

The Vision of Cathenge

From the beginning, the vision of Cathenge and of the Catolith Cat Statue has been exceedingly difficult to realize because it combines lighting effects and interactivity in very specific ways and is dependent on the large format 3D printing to achieve. However, each installation of Cathenge succeeded in communicating this vision in different ways, but never completely to my satisfaction, and that’s why I have continued working on the project.

The goal has been to express the concept of “Holofelinity: Universal Cat Consciousness”. Holofelinity is the magical power of the Ancient Lyran Space Cats to manifest their minds over matter and to transform themselves into any shape. This is expressed in the artwork as “Harmonic Purring” (AKA; “Purrbration of Holofelinity”), an evocation of the capacity of the Space Cats to purr their visions into material form.

Ancient Lyran Space Cat materialized as Bastet idol levitating pyramid using chromatic spectra of the Purrbration of Holofelinity.

The Kittolith

In order to reach this goal, it was instrumental to create a smaller version of the Catolith, the “Kittolith”:

The Kittolith at Miami Art Week

Because the Kittolith presents as a single statue instead of a circle of statues (as in Cathenge) it has been necessary to condense the interactive harmonic purring system into one sculpture. This has been done using LiDAR. People interact with the LiDAR beam extending from the collar of the Kittolith and trigger different frequencies (“Solfeggio Tones”). The infographic below shows how the Kittolith works with the use of Solfeggio sound healing tones:

From Kittolith to Catolith

The “Kittolith Interactive Sound System” (KISS) was adapted for use in the Catolith. The photo gallery below documents our process of creating the New Catolith. Essential to this process was the design and construction of a new wooden base for the Catolith.

CAD drawing of wooden Catolith base

This new, lighter base not only facilitates a wider range of possibilities of exhibitions because of its much reduced weight (compared to the previous concrete bases), but also resolves acoustic issues since the wooden base acts as a ported speaker cabinet for the subwoofer installed in the base. Below is a gallery of photos of the new Catolith and its new base under construction:

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Opening Tues. June 11th: The Catoliths at KALW Studio Gallery!!

Group Show featuring:

Exhibition Opening and Live Broadcast Panel discussion with the artists moderated by Ben Trefny:

5 – 7 PM (doors open at 5, discussion at 6)
Tuesday, June 11th
KALW
220 Montgomery St., SF, CA 94104
Admission free – All ages

The exhibition will be up through August 1st 2024.

(Eventbrite link at bottom of page to reserve free tix)

Public broadcasting station, KALW, recently moved their radio station’s studios to the heart of San Francisco’s financial district where they reside in the ground floor lobby of the historic Mills Building located at 220 Montgomery (Montgomery and Bush). The spacious lobby provides a new and exciting arts and events space. KALW executive director, Ben Trefny, is curating a series of art exhibits in the lobby.

The KALW lobby space features large storefront windows looking out on busy Montgomery St. which are a perfect place to perch the Catoliths. Two Catoliths will be placed, one in each large window, on either side of the entrance to the radio station where they will be seen by motorists and pedestrians alike, and, of course, by visitors to the station. These Catoliths will feature their hallmark interactive purring (Purrbration of Holofelinity).

Cathenge by David Normal
Infinity Box by Matt Elson
Sculpture by Brenden Darby
Painting by Jesse Pemberton
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Kittolith 2.0

In February we completed the “New Prototype Kittolith” and debuted it at the Space Cat Cavalcade. This 5′ tall Catolith was printed by Re3D in Houston, Texas. The sound and lights were created by Theremin Barney, Artur Pyrogovskyi, and Aaron Winette. In this video I am demonstrating the motion detection based sound/light interactivity that Barney engineered using passive infrared sensors. The cat itself is a speaker. A kind of transductive speaker is affixed to the perimeter wall of the cat statue and the entire plastic cat vibrates to produce the sound. The sounds are solfeggio tones that Artur programmed in a randomized cycle to be triggered by the voltage signal transmitted from Barney’s motion detection circuit. This is still a work in progress, but we are developing this system to be used in the ring of six Catoliths that will be installed at Patricia’s Green.

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Blue Sparkle Kitten Print

Today I printed out a small version of “Thanata” the Catolith of Death in sparkly blue-green irridescent PLA plastic. This is the first version of the Catolith that I’ve modeled with decorative surface embellishment. I modeled this in the subdivision surface modeler “Sculpt” of Cimema 4D 3D software. My intention is to use these surface details as the basis for painted decoration of the big Catoliths. This small print is a useful experiment in painting technique that can be applied on a much larger scale.

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Printing Test with Modified CR-10 S5

“Dipping your toe in the water”.  The saying is something like that, right?  Well, in this case it is a plastic cat toe.

I’ve been running test prints of just the toe of the cat.  First on the smaller Ender 3 printer with smaller size nozzle and now on the larger CR-10 S5 printer with correspondingly larger gauge of nozzle.  I’ve modified this printer with a direct drive extruder and an improved bed heater.  This is the first print I’ve done with the large printer.  I am testing all of the parameters and specifications in preparation for replicating this with another 6 printers.  There will be a total of seven printers dedicated to producing cathenge.  I reckon one will be devoted to each section of the six height segments of the Catolith and the seventh for printing the divider components.

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3D Printer Setup for Cathenge Production

Creality CR-10 S5 large format 3D printer being modified for Cathenge production.

I’m setting up a print farm of 7 of these CR-10 S5 printers. This is the first one which I am testing modifications on. This printer has a 500*500*500 mm build space, however the stock print bed only heats a 300*300 area, so I have upgraded this with a 500*500 heat mat. I also added the crossbraces since I anticipate that as the print grows tall and the load heavy that the z-axis will need all the reinforcement it can get.

Next up: I will replace the bowden style extruder with a direct drive extruder for greater printing efficiency and capability.

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3D Printing Catoliths 2022

These feet of a “Mini-Kittolith” are one of the very first things I printed since resolving to undertake on my own the printing of Cathenge for Patricia’s Green myself. 

I’ve opted to print Cathenge myself. It’s a big undertaking – typically people print something the size of an action figure, but it’s possible to do much larger things, and so I’m printing all 6 Catoliths. Doing the printing myself gives me the latitude to experiment with the design and the technique and that is essentially what artistic control is about.

I was able to source high quality yet inexpensive large format 3D printers (Creality CR-10 S5) which give me a 500*500*500 mm build space to work with. I am setting up seven of these printers at my studio in Stinson Beach. Using all seven printers at once I estimate I can produce one cat in 3 days. I’ll begin production of Catoliths by the second week of April and hazard to guess I’ll finish all six Catoliths within a month.

Of course, I get to keep the printers which opens up a whole new world of artistic possibilities for me. Building on my long experience in 3D modeling, I envision new “Crazyological” sculptures 3D printed and embellished with paint, lighting effects, interactivity and/or kinetics. It’s quite exciting!

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Cathenge Prototype in David Normal Studio Spring 2019

This 3D printed Catolith prototype “Kittolith”. Printed by Christopher Christensen. This prototype features motion activated interactive purring by Theremin Barney. Ultimately, we settled on touch sensitivity through “Capacitive Sensing” as the mechanism of interactivity for the large Catoliths at Cathenge, Black Rock City 2019.