We are building the Gift Horse onsite at South Hall in San Jose this week and next. The first couple of days involved meeting our neighbors and getting acquainted. By the third day, we hit our stride and fortunately, all the measurements we made in the Sketchup model of the Gift Horse translated perfectly to real life. Astounding.

By late afternoon we were finally assembling the wagon for the giant Trojan Horse, which will be pushed during the Green Prix parade on Saturday, September 18th by many costumed Greek Warriors. Later in the day, the horse will be "gifted" to the San Jose Art Museum, where it will join the Retro-Tech exhibition.

Here is the wagon, finished and stable. It wheeled around quite easily.

By now it,was 7pm and we were exhausted but we wanted to start assembling. We got help from some of the other artists and constructed the main body of the Gift Horse.

A headlesss horse wouldn't do. We soldiered on and affixed with the head piece followed by the nose.

Finally, a finished horse armature! Stay tuned, we'll be putting on the panels in the next several days.

We have the legs, and via our roller-skate moving dollies, they are moving forward and out - just like this KS campaign.The rump of the horse is also near completion and the panels are being cut. A fitting end - as we have only 4 days until this KS campaign ends - pass on the word if you can. We very much appreciate all the contributions and warm support we've recieved - thanks again!

We are in full production mode as we enter the August - here are some shots of the horse's wooden panels coming off the press at Electric Works this week - 53 sheets in total! The panels are made of 70% recycled paper with a smooth paper liner and printed with inkjet chemical-free inks.

Next up, we'll be cutting the panels out with the Shopbot and fitting them to the wooden frame of the horse - stay tuned.

Thanks to everyone who has donated so far - we really appreciate every contribution. It's only 4 1/2 weeks until we transport the horse to the Biennial and only 12 days until this KS campaign ends! Please spread the word and help us complete this monumental but sustainable project.

We just finished the models of the first 8 viruses (12 total). These paper sculptures will be built during the 01SJ "Out of the Garage, Into the World" workshops (from Sept 4th-14th) and placed inside the belly of the Trojan Horse.

The trick is to make forms are both aesthetically pleasing and easy to fold, so that newcomers can help build hundreds of the viruses.

Top row (left to right): Andromeda Strain, Tobacco Mosaic Virus, T-Virus*, Rabies, Smallpox
Bottom row: Foot-in-mouth disease**, Snow Crash, Dengue Fever

The viruses are real, imaginary and computer viruses (the last set is what we're working on now, which has been challenging)

* this is a zombie virus from the Resident Evil video game
** yes, this is a real virus

For the last several weeks, we have been working nonstop to finish both the interior armature and the exterior printed panels. Taking the advice from an engineer friends of ours, we have produced a 1/4 scale model, where we can work out defects and irregularities.

The armature is akin to the framing of a wall and the prints are like the drywall, only imagine 100 panels each unique and at crazy angles with multiple intersecting planes, which makes accuracy vital to a successful build.

Thanks to everyone your support and for spreading the word, as we're closing in on the campaign: http://kck.st/9Fy7DF

We just made the first four viruses for the Gift Horse project. Twelve total -- real, imaginary and computer viruses -- will go inside the belly of the horse during the 01SJ Biennial and then be released from the horse on September 18th in the San Jose Art Museum.

A few people have asked us: Why viruses?

We want to celebrate the viral nature of art and ideas and are embracing and emerging form of art authorship, where the artist collaborates with the public to produce the artwork in a partnership. The viruses, built by public hands in a series of workshops, will all look slightly different. The Trojan Horse, perfect in its spectacle-based design, is the carrier of "everyone's art" into the art museum.

Below is a comparison of reference images and their corresponding papercraft models for Tobacco Mosaic Virus, Smallpox, Andromeda Strain and Dengue Fever.

Other viruses include Rabies, Snow Crash, Captain Trips (The Stand), T-Virus (Resident Evil), Foot-and-mouth Disease, ILOVEYOU (computer virus), Creeper (computer virus, 1971) and Elk Cloner (first personal computer virus, Apple II, 1982).

The way the Kickstarter funding works is that if you don't make your funding, you get *nothing*. We're just over three weeks away, so now is the time to kick in a donation.

First off, a shout out to all the new donors in the last couple weeks. We are now at about 33% funding! And please continue to spread the word: http://kck.st/9Fy7DF

Below are some new pictures: first, we have the final rendered 3D model. Directly from this design, we will be printing the panels in the upcoming weeks which will clad the exterior body of the horse -- so that it will look perfectly like this very digital model.

Also, we have begun the actual fabrication process for the internal structure. The legwork was much more complicated than we originally anticipated and we have turned towards working with our friend and fabricator, Rob Bell, to assist with making the structure.

The challenge was to make something that was structurally sound, easy to assemble/disassemble and most importantly, to hold hundreds of 3D panels to form a precise exterior cladding. We ended up doing some intense designs in Sketchup and this week, we are producing a 1/4 scale model from wood, using Rob's Shopbot -- a computer-cutting device from 3D forms.

We're continuing to spread the word and talk about the amazing upcoming 01SJ Biennial (http://01sj.org) We did a great talk at ZSALON last week and have one coming next week at dorkbot in San Francisco (http://www.dorkbot.org/dorkbotsf/)

Thanks to everyone who has donated to Gift Horse so far. Right now, we're just above 25% of funding. Keep spreading the word!

We have been busy designing the internal structure of the horse. The trick is to make something which can be easily assembled, built from recycled wood, physically stable, can support exterior cladding of printed panels...and still be reasonably-priced.

We are working with Rob Bell, a friend who has a Shopbot, which can cut wood panels from a 3D Sketchup model to specific shapes. Its a lot of design time, but will cut down fabrication cost and time by a huge amount.