click into the foam0 pairs from nothingΔE · Δt ≥ ħ / 2

MEDIENWERKSTATT006 · NEW VERSION 2026 · 21.10.2026

THE NATURE OF NOTHINGCAST FOR ETERNITY

VERLORENE FORM · LOST FORM

“Nothing” doesn’t exist. Instead there is quantum foam – and bronzes born from a cavity left by melted-out wax. The new version entangles two kinds of nothing: the vacuum of physics and the founder’s lost mould.

AV · long version 4:54
Trailer 3:24
4K · 3840 × 2160 · 16:9 · MP4
GLB · 3D animation 178 s
Experience · FLUCTUATION
Art & Science Game · ARCHIVE OF NOTHING
AR · 18 bronzes

0NIHIL · concept

Two kinds of nothing

In March 2023 the Liechtenstein Garden Palace in Vienna showed “Cast for Eternity. The Bronzes of the Princes of Liechtenstein”. Markus Wintersberger scanned bronzes there and turned them into the series “The Nature of Nothing – Cast for Eternity”: as meshes, point clouds, splinters, foam.

The new version 2026 takes the title literally. A Renaissance bronze is born in lost-wax casting: a wax model is encased in plaster and burnt out in the kiln – the figure exists only as a cavity until molten bronze fills the nothing. Physics in turn says: even empty space cooled to absolute zero is not empty. From the uncertainty principle and E = mc² follows that particle pairs appear and vanish – quantum foam.

Two nothings meet: the vacuum that brings forth particles, and the mould that brings forth bronzes. One lives 10⁻²¹ seconds, the other is “cast for eternity” – and yet Adriaen de Vries’ Christ in Distress (1607) has only some 10¹⁰ seconds behind it.

The visual language follows the material: vacuum black, wax, plaster, glow, bronze, patina. Sprues become Feynman diagrams. Type in EB Garamond for inscription and history, Space Mono for measurement and formula; a logarithmic time ruler from Planck time to the age of the universe accompanies every image.

ΔE · Δt ≥ ħ / 2

E = m c²

F / A = − π² ħ c / 240 a⁴

“Nothing” doesn’t exist. Instead, there is “quantum foam”. Particles can come from nothing.after DON LINCOLN · BIG THINK · 16.2.2023

Nil posse creari de nilo.LUCRETIUS · DE RERUM NATURA I, 155 f. — “Nothing can be created from nothing.”

Our language is inadequate to describe quantum reality.after MARCELO GLEISER · BIG THINK / 13.8 · 4.1.2023

INIHILvacuum, pair creation

IICERAwax, burn-out

IIIFORMA PERDITAmould, Casimir

IVFUSIOcasting, glow

VAETERNITASpatina, collection

VISPUMAfoam, collapse

IAV · 4K · 3840 × 2160

Two independent films

The long version follows casting as a narrative in six chapters – from vacuum through wax, mould and glow to patina and foam. The trailer is a film of its own: diptychs of positive and negative, torsions, bell strikes as cuts. Image and sound are generated entirely from the 2023 3D scans and a treatment of the V&A film on Renaissance indirect casting; the sound is bronze – modal synthesis of bell partials, pairs as left/right mirrored pulses.

▶Long version · 4:54YouTube loads only after a click · until release: 1080p preview from this server

THE NATURE OF NOTHING — CAST FOR ETERNITY · VERLORENE FORM 2026AV · 4:54 · 4K · 16:9 · MP4 · stereo

▶Trailer · 3:24YouTube loads only after a click · until release: 1080p preview from this server

VERLORENE FORM · TRAILER 2026AV · 3:24 · 4K · 16:9 · MP4

IIGLB · 3D animation 178 s

The Garden Palace as archive

A reconstructed, animated 3D scene: the Liechtenstein Garden Palace in the Rossau as a line drawing, in the Sala terrena 18 plinths on an ellipse, above them a casting funnel with sprues running to each bronze – a Feynman diagram of the collection.

Quantum foam fluctuates in the room, 40 particle–antiparticle pairs appear and vanish, two Casimir plates breathe. The ceiling fresco of the Hercules Hall (Andrea Pozzo, 1704–08) appears as spiral foam in which Hercules ascends. The camera flight stored in the GLB (178 s) leads from the garden through the portal into the Sala terrena, around the bronzes, up into the Hercules Hall, over the roof to the aerial view.

Free, simplified reconstruction · Domenico Egidio Rossi / Domenico Martinelli, from 1691 · Fürstengasse 1, 1090 Vienna

Experience ▸ GLB ↓ (meshopt)

▶3D animation · 2:58YouTube loads only after a click · until release: 1080p preview from this server

camera flight from the GLB4K · 2:58

0:00Garden

0:18Portal

0:44Sala terrena

1:52Hercules Hall

2:20Roof

2:38Aerial

IIIplayable models

Experience · Game · AR

EXPERIENCE · GLB

FLUCTUATION

The animated GLB scene as a simulation model: film mode with the 178 s camera flight, simulation with switchable layers – and the game: catch particle pairs before they annihilate, fill the furnace with ΔE, cast the 18 bronzes. The faster you move the camera, the larger the capture circle (Δx·Δp).

open ▸

ART & SCIENCE GAME · DESKTOP · WEB

ARCHIVE OF NOTHING

A walkable Garden Palace in first person. Seven seals open seven experiments:

pair creation – borrowing energy from nothing
uncertainty – electron versus bronze
Casimir – the pushing nothing
cera perdita – the twelve steps of casting
bell bronze – tin and sound
time ruler – Planck to eternity
collection and AR window

play ▸

AR · WEBXR · QUICK LOOK

18 bronzes in your room

The scans of the Princely bronzes as AR objects: place them in your own room on a phone (Android: Scene Viewer / WebXR, iOS: Quick Look) – small bronzes on the table, splinters, sphere cages, foam.

AR ▸

Mini game · time ruler

pick an event, then click its place on the logarithmic ruler (±1.5 decades)

IVcollection · 3D scans 2023

18 bronzes of the Princes of Liechtenstein

The scans were made in the Garden Palace in March 2023 and transformed back then – into sphere cages, splinters, crystals, foam. Each tile shows the bronze in raking light; a click (or the switch) turns it into the negative: the mould, the nothing it was cast from.

attributions after the exhibition’s object data · small bronzes 16th/17th c.

**Christ in Distress · I***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · I***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Melt***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Melt***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Sphere***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Sphere***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Radiation***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Radiation***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Sparks***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Sparks***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Geode***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Geode***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Space Fold***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Christ in Distress · Space Fold***Adriaen de Vries, 1607*

**Dancing Faun · I***Massimiliano Soldani-Benzi, 1695–97*

**Dancing Faun · I***Massimiliano Soldani-Benzi, 1695–97*

**Dancing Faun · II***Massimiliano Soldani-Benzi, 1695–97*

**Dancing Faun · II***Massimiliano Soldani-Benzi, 1695–97*

**Hercules and a Centaur · Foam***nach Giambologna*

**Hercules and a Centaur · Foam***nach Giambologna*

**Hercules and a Centaur · Crystal***nach Giambologna*

**Hercules and a Centaur · Crystal***nach Giambologna*

**Kneeling Woman Bathing · I***Giovanni Francesco Susini, 2. Viertel 17. Jh.*

**Kneeling Woman Bathing · I***Giovanni Francesco Susini, 2. Viertel 17. Jh.*

**Kneeling Woman Bathing · II***Giovanni Francesco Susini, 2. Viertel 17. Jh.*

**Kneeling Woman Bathing · II***Giovanni Francesco Susini, 2. Viertel 17. Jh.*

**Mercury · Flight***Giambologna-Werkstatt / Adriaen de Vries*

**Mercury · Flight***Giambologna-Werkstatt / Adriaen de Vries*

**Mercury · Mass***Giambologna-Werkstatt / Adriaen de Vries*

**Mercury · Mass***Giambologna-Werkstatt / Adriaen de Vries*

**Rape of a Sabine Woman · Particles***Antonio Susini, um 1600*

**Rape of a Sabine Woman · Particles***Antonio Susini, um 1600*

**Rape of a Sabine Woman***Antonio Susini, um 1600*

**Rape of a Sabine Woman***Antonio Susini, um 1600*

Sketchfab Collection · … models · live◉ Collection ↗ skfb.ly/oJIuA ↗

loading collection …

Vcycle · references

Interwoven

LOST FORM builds on the 2023 project and links it to the cycle of collection and archive works by medienwerkstatt006 – the dissolved cabinet of curiosities, the Baroque collection of Göttweig, the deep time of the Krahuletz Museum. The Garden Palace is museum, archive and laboratory at once.

2023 · original projectThe Nature of Nothing – Cast for Eternity 2026 · new versionVERLORENE FORM

2023The Nature of Nothing – Cast for Eternity · original project LIECHTENSTEIN · The Princely CollectionsCast for Eternity. The Bronzes of the Princes of Liechtenstein · 1.–31.3.2023 Big Think · Don Lincoln“Nothing” doesn’t exist. Instead, there is “quantum foam”Big Think · 13.8 · Marcelo GleiserOur language is inadequate to describe quantum reality Sketchfab · mwintersbergerThe Nature of Nothing – Cast for Eternity · Collection Victoria and Albert MuseumHow was it made? Lost-wax bronze casting Google MapsPalais Liechtenstein · Fürstengasse 1, 1090 Wien Zyklus · WunderkammerRandnotizen oder die Auflösung der Wunderkammer Zyklus · SammlungGöttwAIg Wunderkammer(21) · Stift Göttweig Zyklus · TiefenzeitsmART Data BRIDGE Krahuletz

VIdata · process

Credits

Work	THE NATURE OF NOTHING — CAST FOR ETERNITY · VERLORENE FORM / LOST FORM (new version 2026)
Artist	Markus Wintersberger · medienwerkstatt006, Vienna
Reference	The Nature of Nothing – Cast for Eternity (2023) · exhibition “Cast for Eternity. The Bronzes of the Princes of Liechtenstein”, Liechtenstein Garden Palace, Vienna, 1–31 March 2023
AV	long version 4:54 · trailer 3:24 · 3D animation 2:58 · 3840 × 2160 · 25 fps · H.264 · AAC 48 kHz stereo · −16 LUFS
3D	GLB (glTF 2.0) with 178 s animation and camera · 18 scans (meshes and point clouds) · meshopt web version · 18 single GLBs for AR
Interactive	experience FLUCTUATION (three.js) · Art & Science game ARCHIVE OF NOTHING (web + desktop macOS) · AR (model-viewer: WebXR, Scene Viewer, Quick Look)
Process	point-splatting renderer (Python / NumPy / Numba), generative sound synthesis (bell modal synthesis, pair pulses, convolution reverb), ffmpeg · AI-assisted realisation (Claude, Anthropic)
Footage	treated excerpts from “How was it made? Lost-wax bronze casting” © Victoria and Albert Museum, London

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