At its peak, AltSpace was a very distinctive gathering. There was someone haunted by an odd mechanical world. There was also someone who had designed an underground poker club. Naturally, there was someone who couldn't control the volume of their voice and someone who couldn't stand shouting.
Each of AltSpace's departments had its own badge. Left to right: design, copy, R&D, management. The badges were used for merchandise and general boasting. Design by Laar, of course.
This is what a pitch could look like. We designed something (in this case a proposal for Yandex Institute of Technology and Yandex Research & Development) and then printed it out and played with it and looked what it felt just using it.
AltSpace has been, pretty much, designing on principle. This is a project of doing a computer-controlled interactive water park on a mountain, art directed by Gia Djakhaya.
Even now, matured, more specialised and led by Igor Voloshuk, who superseded me as AltSpace CEO, the place still exhibits the spirit of its singular past. Igor insists, for instance, that his visitors pull through six flights of stairs—steeper, even, than those of Amsterdam's old houses.
A very characteristic work, I think. An opening video for the 2012 chess championship with a taste of vague gloom and depression.
