engineering

Sharks!

Sharks! is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Sharks! rather than just read about it. In short: Sharks! is an art installation in London, England by architect Jaimie Shorten. The art was built following its concept winning the 2020 Antepavilion, an annual art contest.

Key takeaways

Sharks! belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Sharks! to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Sharks! from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Sharks! is an art installation in London, England by architect Jaimie Shorten. The art was built following its concept winning the 2020 Antepavilion, an annual art contest. Currently, they are displayed on floating platforms on the Regent's Canal, in front of the art centre in repurposed docks at 55 Laburnum Street, in Hoxton within the Borough of Hackney.

Art Sharks! consists of five life-sized fibreglass model sharks. The project was inspired by The Headington Shark in Oxford. The installation cost £25,000. It was selected and built as the 2020 Antepavilion, fitting the year's theme of "tension of authoritarian governance of the built environment and aesthetic libertarianism". Shorten said that he thinks of the sharks as ingénues, that have surfaced in the "centre of hipster maelstrom" and as "dumb recipients of the horrible world" that are redeemed through being in Hoxton and "being together".

Dispute In August 2020 Hackney London Borough Council obtained an interim injunction order to prohibit Sharks! from being installed at the Regent's Canal in Hoxton. As stated in the interim injunction order, the Order was made at a hearing without notice to the Defendants. In October the council obtained a varied interim High Court injunction order to remove the work from the canal after a reconsideration hearing. In April 2021 Sharks! was relocated to Islington Boat Club but subsequently removed in June and returned to Antepavilion where they were stored on a river barge. The Court of Appeal granted permission to appeal the injunction order in July. Hackney Council lost an appeal by Antepavilion to Sharks! on the Regent's Canal in the summer of 2024. According to Antepavilion, the council now has to decide whether Sharks! requires planning permission.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Sharks!

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Sharks! claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Sharks! before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Sharks! ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Sharks!

In research: Sharks! appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Sharks! in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Sharks! is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2020 controversies, 2020 establishments in England, 2020 sculptures, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Sharks! outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Sharks! in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Sharks! means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Sharks! out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Sharks! in simple terms?

Sharks! is an art installation in London, England by architect Jaimie Shorten. The art was built following its concept winning the 2020 Antepavilion, an annual art contest.

Why does Sharks! matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Sharks!?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Sharks!.