Cadence of the Spiral Kinetic Installation by Yusuke Kamiyama is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2026 Silver A' Design Award in Fine Arts and Art Installation Design Competition Category.
SilverFine Art· 2026
Cadence of the Spiral Kinetic Installation
Client: Spline Design Hub Inc.
Silver A' Design Award Winner in Fine Art Category
Verified Award Winner
Verify Award Status for #182460The Design
About Cadence of the Spiral Kinetic Installation
Cadence of the Spiral explores time as something elastic, relational, and alive. A strip of stainless spring steel is shaped into an ever evolving form by thirty mechanical arms moving in subtle, phase shifted rhythms. As the spiral breathes, twists, and reorganizes itself, no two moments are ever the same. Inspired by the mainspring of a mechanical watch, the work reinterprets coiled metal as a vessel of stored energy and temporal flow. Rather than repeating motion, it reveals change through controlled variation, time is not measured but felt.
The Recognition
About the Silver A' Design Award
Cadence of the Spiral Kinetic Installation is a Silver A' Design Award winner, an extraordinarily prestigious recognition granted to top-of-the-line, gorgeous, and impressive designs. Silver winners are tremendously brilliant and exceedingly creative works that illustrate the outstanding expertise, talent, and acuity of their designers. Cadence of the Spiral Kinetic Installation is expected to be a wonderful, showpiece work that is remarkably professional and profoundly innovative. This Silver A' Design Award-winning design is a highly notable, admired invention that benefits and advances the boundaries of art, science, design, and technology. Cadence of the Spiral Kinetic Installation is a vastly envied creation that evokes desires, introduces positive feelings, and sparks amazement and wonderment.
Interviews
Design Interview
What is the main principle, idea and inspiration behind your design?
The inspiration for this work lies in the mainspring of a mechanical watch. A tightly wound strip of metal appeared to me as a vessel holding the energy and rhythm of time itself. When gently lifted, it responded with a faint motion, as if about to begin a heartbeat. In that moment, the spiral emerged not as a mere object, but as a physical manifestation of invisible time. At the core of this work is the idea of reconsidering time not as something to be measured, but as something to be felt.
What has been your main focus in designing this work? Especially what did you want to achieve?
What I wanted to achieve was to express time as something elastic, relational, and alive. Unlike a watch that marks time with precision, the spiral in this work never settles into a single form. My main focus was the quality of movement—to let viewers perceive time not as something measured, but as something felt, through controlled irregularity rather than mechanical uniformity.
What are your future plans for this award winning design?
The work was first presented in Japan and is currently being prepared for international exhibition. Going forward, I hope to show it in more countries and within different cultural contexts, exploring how the theme of time perception is received across them.
Behind the Design
Press Kit
Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.
- Unique Properties
- A long stainless-steel spiral is dynamically deformed by independently actuated arms, generating continuous reorganization through tension and release. Unlike static sculpture, the form never settles; it is constantly restructured into shifting orders. The spiral functions as a physical model of time—elastic, unstable, and relational. Controlled irregularity replaces mechanical uniformity, allowing viewers to perceive time not as measurement, but as a living and evolving order.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- Material: Blast-finished stainless spring steel (0.3 mm thickness, 80 mm width)
Spiral pitch: 100 mm
Number of turns: 10
Control: PC-based control system
Installation footprint: Approx. 2000 mm × 2000 mm × 2000 mm
Power: AC 100–240 V - Tags
- Kinetic art, Spiral structure, Time perception, Mechanical rhythm, Parametric design, Stainless steel sculpture, Dynamic installation, Temporal form
- Production Technology
- A custom-fabricated stainless-steel spiral plate forms the core structure, paired with a bespoke linear actuation system developed for this work. Most mechanical components—including joints, mounts, and structural interfaces—were custom-designed to enable precise distributed deformation. Motion is coordinated through a PC-based control architecture enabling synchronized, phase-shifted oscillations. Parametric modeling and simulation optimized stress distribution and torsional balance.
- Design Challenge
- The primary challenge was balancing structural stability with expressive flexibility. The spiral required sufficient rigidity to maintain form, yet enough elasticity to allow dynamic deformation. Managing distributed mechanical stress while achieving organic motion demanded extensive iteration. Technological constraints of synchronized actuation and material fatigue also required innovative solutions to preserve both safety and poetic integrity.
- Research
- This practice-based design research explores time as a spatial and kinetic phenomenon. Through iterative prototyping combining mechanical engineering and artistic experimentation, parametric modeling, structural simulation, and motion analysis were employed. Audience observation during exhibitions informed the study. The research identified perceptual shifts generated by micro-irregular motion, demonstrating how controlled instability enhances emotional engagement and contributes to contemporary kinetic art and experiential design.
- Inspiration
- Inspired by the mainspring of a mechanical watch, Cadence of the Spiral reconsiders the spiral beyond its functional role. The tightly wound strip of metal appeared as a vessel containing latent energy and rhythm of time itself. When gently lifted, it responded with subtle motion, as if about to begin a heartbeat. The spiral thus emerged not as an object, but as a physical manifestation of invisible time—an embodiment of tension and release within temporal experience.
- Project Duration
- The project began in Tokyo in March 2025 and was completed in November 2025. Prototyping and structural validation were conducted in Tokyo. Developed in collaboration with Seiko Watch Corporation to explore the cultural and mechanical heritage of horology, the work was exhibited in Japan and is currently being prepared for international presentation.
- Operation Flow
- The spiral slowly shifts between tension and release. As the supporting arms extend and retract, the form breathes, twists, and reorganizes itself. There is no fixed choreography; instead, subtle variations create moments of alignment and misalignment. Viewers experience a continuous transformation—sometimes synchronized, sometimes slightly off—evoking the sensation of time that never fully repeats yet always returns.
- Patents
- Copyrights belong to Spline Design Hub Inc., 2025.
- Team Members
- Yusuke Kamiyama
Shin Sakamoto
Kaku Murayama
Fumiya Nakano - Image Credits
- IMAGE CREDITS: Daisuke Ohki
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