My lady K sent me over this today and it really resonated with me. This is a great pre-emptive strike against NIMBYism ( = Not In My Back Yard ism) where every one needs power lines and the electricity that comes from them (unless you live off the grid I guess) but doesn’t want big ugly powerline towers in their back yard, which I totally get. Turning them into beautiful and mysterious giant skeletons is a really imaginative and fun solution. The figures were designed by Choi + Shine and are positionable so that they can be posed to appear to respond to their environment or situation.

The pylon-figures can be configured to respond to their environment with appropriate gestures. As the carried electrical lines ascend a hill, the pylon-figures change posture, imitating a climbing person. Over long spans, the pylon-figure stretches to gain increased height, crouches for increased strength or strains under the weight of the wires.

- from the the Choi + Shine site.

There is the whole school of thought that functional objects can be beautiful, things like Calatrava’s bridges:

But what about making things that are functional beautiful? I love the idea of this approach too. Function doesn’t have to be the final determinant of form. People are smart and certainly by issuing the challenge to make boring, ugly utilitarian objects that fill our man-made landscapes look cool we could find ways to build them for as cheaply but make them fun and interesting. I would love to see more of this going on in the world, in both urban and non-urban environments. I think you’d see people’s attitudes and behaviors towards these things shift as well.