Contraption-building workshop with Joseph Herscher

Joseph Herscher is an ex-WSCW student who is now based in London. He specialises in making and filming Rube Goldberg machines and the culture of DIY contraption building. With his machines, he solves everyday problems using familiar objects in unfamiliar ways. Joseph’s videos can be found on his You Tube channel here which has a huge following of over 7.7 million subscribers! – some videos have have over 120 million views!

Recently we were very lucky to have him facilitate a workshop with our students/ākonga. As part of this workshop, he filmed them making their own machines with him for a documentary about kinetic art called Whiz Bang, which is produced by Julia Lewis.

Joseph’s typical format for the workshop involves dividing students into teams who work on creating continuous chain reactions along panels. Our students/ākonga were in small groups making a ball move along the panel through a variety of mechanisms, with lots of trial and error, fun & laughter! We’re really grateful that Joseph took time out of his busy schedule to facilitate the workshop and tell us about how he got to where he is today, including the influence of his time at WSCW!

Here is a link to Joseph’s website if you would like to learn more about his creative mahi.