My friend and I needed to make a kinetic art project for our AP Physics class, and we wanted to do a 3d puzzle. Since the 50 year anniversary of the moon landing is this year, we decided to make it space themed.

Supplies

1) Enough paper to make four of the paintings in the size you want. We made ours 45cm x 112.5cm because we were putting them on the sides of cubes that were 7.5cm on all sides. Our final puzzle was 6 cubes by 15.

2) Painting supplies

3) String

4) Hot glue

5) Cubes. We made ours out of styrofoam by cutting up large pieces with a saw. Our cubes were 7.5cm on all sides.

6) Something to suspend your puzzle from. If you had a strong ceiling, you could use that. We used an old clothes rack.

7) A way to cut up your paintings. We used an exacto knife and scissors.

8) Weights to hang on the strings to weigh them down.

Step 1: Paint

These will be the paintings that hang on all four sides of the puzzle. We made ours 45cm x 112.5cm.

Step 2: Cut

Now you need to cut the paintings into 7.5cm x 7.5cm squares, so you can put them on the sides of the cubes. We made a grid on the back of the paintings, and used an exacto knife and a meter stick to cut each column, then we cut the rest with scissors.

Step 3: Thread the String Through the Cubes

We used a wooden dowel to make a hole in the middle of the cubes, then we used the back of the dowel to push the string through it. We made 6 strings of cubes, each with 15 individual cubes on them.