Despite declaring that he is not a musician, it would be hard not use the word to describe Javier Muñoz after seeing his 3D printed guitar, ‘El Dorado.’
The seed for the project was planted back in 2015 when Muñoz visited the 3D PrintShow in New York with the aid of a grant from his college, the Escuela Tecnológica Instituto Técnico Central (ETITC). While there, he became fascinated with the myriad possibilities presented through 3D printing technology. He was particularly drawn to the 3D printed guitars designed by Olaf Diegel that were on display at the fair. And while it is true that you don’t have to be a musician to appreciate the beauty of Diegel’s creations, you do have to be one to engage in jam sessions, which is exactly what Muñoz did at the stand.
Upon returning to Colombia, Muñoz decided to follow up on these fascinating instruments and see if he couldn’t begin to experiment with some creations of his own. After some initial research, he discovered that Diegel’s guitars were all created using polymers, an option that put experimentation financially out of reach. Muñoz thought he had reached an endpoint and so he sadly filed the project away in his mind and went on to engage in other explorations.
“The one that I had played in New York had the skyline of the city and was printed in the characteristic colors of the United States, drawn from the flag,” he explained. “Other models that I had seen had atoms or spiderwebs, but I didn’t like those as much as the one that had the American inspired design, it even had the Statue of Liberty! I wanted to print something that would reference our [Colombian] culture, and felt that the first guitar to be 3D printed in Colombia had to be 100% Colombian in design.”
For both Javier and Ana Maria, the project was about more than the creation of a single guitar. Instead, it was a message to everyone in Colombia:
“Engineers, designers, publicists, doctors, architects, students big and small, risk takers, and dreamers: we can all do it! The technology is just a tool, the talent is always in our minds, in our imaginations.
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