page_title: Tensegrity
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Tensegrity / History
caption_attribution_description: English: An illustration showing Kenneth Snelson's X-Module design of 1948 as embodied in a two-module column. It only shows the design as pertains to tensegrity, and does not duplicate the original art work.
context_page_description: Tensegrity, tensional integrity or floating compression is a structural principle based on a system of isolated components under compression inside a network of continuous tension, and arranged in such a way that the compressed members do not touch each other while the prestressed tensioned members delineate the system spatially.
  The term was coined by Buckminster Fuller in the 1960s as a portmanteau of "tensional integrity". The other denomination of tensegrity, floating compression, was used mainly by the constructivist artist Kenneth Snelson.
context_section_description: The origins of tensegrity are controversial. Many traditional structures, such as skin-on-frame kayaks and shōji, use tension and compression elements in a similar fashion.
  In 1948, artist Kenneth Snelson produced his innovative "X-Piece" after artistic explorations at Black Mountain College (where Buckminster Fuller was lecturing) and elsewhere. Some years later, the term "tensegrity" was coined by Fuller, who is best known for his geodesic domes. Throughout his career, Fuller had experimented with incorporating tensile components in his work, such as in the framing of his dymaxion houses.
  Snelson's 1948 innovation spurred Fuller to immediately commission a mast from Snelson. In 1949, Fuller developed a tensegrity-icosahedron based on the technology, and he and his students quickly developed further structures and applied the technology to building domes. After a hiatus, Snelson also went on to produce a plethora of sculptures based on tensegrity concepts. His main body of work began in 1959 when a pivotal exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art took place. At the MOMA exhibition, Fuller had shown the mast and some of his other work.  At this exhibition, Snelson, after a discussion with Fuller and the exhibition organizers regarding credit for the mast, also displayed some work in a vitrine.
  Snelson's best known piece is his 18-meter-high Needle Tower of 1968.
  Russian artist Viatcheslav Koleichuk claimed that the idea of tensegrity was invented first by Kārlis Johansons (lv), a Soviet avant-garde artist of Latvian descent, who contributed some works to the main exhibition of Russian constructivism in 1921. Koleichuk's claim was backed up by Maria Gough for one of the works at the 1921 constructivist exhibition. Snelson has acknowledged the constructivists as an influence for his work (query?). French engineer David Georges Emmerich has also noted how Kārlis Johansons's work (and industrial design ideas) seemed to foresee tensegrity concepts.
caption: Kenneth Snelson's 1948 X-Module Design as embodied in a two-module column[15]
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