Motherboard

What you need to know first of all about the Madagascar Institute is that it’s not a collective. That sounds too hippy, too delicate, and not dangerous enough. They’re a “combine,” a group dedicated to making the kinds of exploding machines that we often dream up for a second before relegating to the corners of our imagination.

Their nearly impossible sculptures and amusements, live performances, and guerrilla events (think Flaming Soccer, Jet Blenders, Zombie Freak Outs, Death Rattlers, Condiment Wars, Electrified See-Saws, and so on) aren’t created for the turtlenecked contemplation of the museum. They thrive on the big, messy, and inspiring public engagement of the carnival, of the parade, of those moments that slack jaws and get people jumping up and down—and sometimes running for safety. It’s the kind of art that could kill you. But if it’s just bleeding and it’s not from an artery, says co-founder Chris Hackett, then you can’t really complain about it.

Motherboard recently visited Madagascar’s Brooklyn workshop, a lair crowded with reclaimed machines and materials, to get an inside peek at their homebrewed rocket science. Like their Brooklyn awesome-things-making brethren (and Motherboard alums) NYC Resistor, Hackett and his crew earn their “institute” moniker in part by leading workshops and classes for the public, in part by relishing the process and the community that goes into every project (the reasons for “Madagascar” are unclear, but maybe it has something to do with those first three letters). But there’s really nothing institutional about them. There are no rules, no standards or expectations to their ground-breaking and machine-breaking fun. Madagascar’s only premise is simple and really hard to dispute: the world needs jet powered merry-go-rounds.