BC – AD: a Contemporary Look at Flint Tools
The BC-AD project is an experimental exploration within the field of Design, and more specifically within the realm of tool making.
Stone and flint tools have been the means of our ancestors' survival for some two million years, magnifying our bodily (teeth, fingernails, fists, etc.) capabilities of cutting/chopping, sawing and pounding. For perspective, humans have been working metals for some six thousand years and plastics for some one hundred and fifiy years. We have an astounding amount of evolutionary experience at designing stone tools.
As product designers we are fascinated by the prospect of integrating thousand-year-old cutting implements manufactured by knapping (hitting one stone against the other or with the aid of a striking antler/stick) with the most contemporary tool making technologies including engineering software and 3D printing.
![]() Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2011, knapped flint (project baseline), printed polymer and stainless steel, 19cm x 5cm x 5cm (dagger),14cm x 8cm x 5cm (hand axe), private collection. |
Picture 1 portrays the baseline through which we re-look at basic tools through current perspective, conventions and knowledge of tool making. We are intrigued at what happens when these two polarities meet. What lies between customization and mass-production? What new forms are generated? How does the digital age influence the making of such tools? And how does 'craft' get updated in the process?
The 'design investigation' took several routes; the use of actual prehistoric stone tools as well as those we had knapped ourselves- an important aspect of understanding the work stages and morphology produced in flint tools.
Photographed objects throughout the text illustrate the various approaches explored during the design process.
The first series of stones were partially dipped in yellow latex rubber, as are contemporary pliers, indicating the 'hand-contact' area and functionally increasing grip / friction / shock absorption as well as reflecting today's industrially-manufactured tools' dogmatic look.
![]() Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2011, rubber-dipped flint, 5cm x 4cm x 1cm, private collection. (Photo: Moti Fishbain) |
Another series of stones were modified and then electroplated with silver, creating a singular new object with updated features highlighted by the reflective surfacing.
For instance some hand axes grew legs allowing them to rest in an upright position. In another case a stone blade received a pronounced thumb-rest communicating its optimal handling position. The silver-plating action is a form of product-gentrification, a lifting of the objects from the cave floor to the table-top level thereby creating a dialogue with silverware.
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The next batch of stone tools breach hominid development in a singular object; Stone tools were three-dimensionally scanned setting the stage for their migration from the physical to the virtual then back again.
The use of digital imaging and probing with such technologies as 3D scanning, MRI and GPR, to name a few, has been increasing rapidly in the field of archeology as in many other sciences, but are generally used as a means of exposing the existing, of revealing, of looking back with a clearer view. We use the same technology to look and move forward.
Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2011, three-dimensionally scanned stone tools.
The scanned stone tools were digitally fitted with custom-designed handles (is software the contemporary craftsperson's ultimate tool?). These were later printed in a Nylon-like polymer using Objet's three-dimensional printing technology. The true manufacturing polarities met here with the virtual world as the mediator. At times the flint's knapped surfaces lent form to the computer-generated surfaces and at times the forms were juxtaposed for contrast.
Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2011, digital stone and handle coupling in progress.
![]() Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2012, knapped flint and printed polymer, 11cm x 8cm x 3cm, private collection. (Photo: Moti Fishbain) |
Many of the tools echo traditional stone-tool typologies with the design retaining the traditional stone-to-handles structural logic as the cord-tie axe illustrates.
Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2012, knapped flint, printed polymer and stainless steel, 14cm x 7cm x 5cm, private collection.(Photo: Moti Fishbain)
Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2012, knapped flint, printed polymer, aluminum and cord, 40cm x 14cm x 5cm, private collection. (Photo: Moti Fishbain) |
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Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2012, knapped flint, printed polymer, aluminum and cord, 40cm x 14cm x 5cm, private collection. (Photo: Moti Fishbain) |
Due to the exact surface definitions, and despite the stones' irregularities, the plastic and flint interface at a very tight tolerance and are truly custom-fitted.
Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2012, knapped flint and printed polymer, 18cm x 9cm x 4cm, private collection. (Photo: Moti Fishbain)
The introduction of industrial manufacturing as a notion is exemplified by the dagger where the external handle remains the constant, and interchangeable 'fitting spacers' do the actual distancing between handle and stone blade. This creates the potential for integrating stone blades of various sizes within given parameters to the same handle design. Here a reference is made to the most industrialized of all flint tools- the black-powder rifle's flint; an actual piece of flint approximately fashioned into a flat cube and affixed to the rifle's spring-loaded spark igniting mechanism. These were manufactured in England as late as the 1940s since black-powder was still in use at that time in certain parts of colonial Africa.
Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow, BC-AD flint tools, 2012, knapped flint and printed polymer, 22cm x 7cm x 5cm, private collection. (Photo: Moti Fishbain)
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Ami Drach and Dov Ganchrow are product designers who worked together from 1996 to 2012. Their studio projects include medical product design, furniture, lighting, museum exhibit design as well as the more personal and experimental design of objects. Their works have been shown extensively and are in private and museum collections. They are both graduates of the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem's Industrial Design Dept. where Dov is a lecturer. Prof. Drach was the former head of the department where he lectured until his death on the 5th of September, 2012.