I am a researcher and trained architect. Since 2023, I am an Assistant Professor for Protohistory of Artificial Intelligence and Machines in the Arts at the University of Amsterdam. After a PhD at EPFL and an SNSF-funded postdoc at ATTP, TU Vienna, I worked at the FHNW Academy of Art and Design Basel, where I was the Head of the Make/Sense PhD programme. I edited three books (Radio Explorations, forthcoming, Ghosts of Transparency, 2019 and Unpleasant Design, 2013) and I research and write about computational modelling, feminist hacking, and posthuman networks in the context of art, design and architecture. My research interests animate a practice at the intersection of computational processes and posthumanist and postcolonial critique of technology. My current research addresses data and measurement, offering a generative perspective on the interrelations between technicity for making and circulating art.
This article presents an approach to practicing ethics when working with large datasets and desig... more This article presents an approach to practicing ethics when working with large datasets and designing data representations. Inspired by feminist critique of technoscience and recent problematizations of digital literacy, we argue that machine learning models can be navigated in a multi-narrative manner when access to training data is well articulated and understood. We programmed and used web-based interfaces to sort, organize, and explore a community-run digital archive of radio signals. An additional perspective on the question of working with datasets is offered from the experience of teaching image synthesis with freely accessible online tools. We hold that the main challenge to social transformations related to digital technologies comes from lingering forms of colonialism and extractive relationships that easily move in and out of the digital domain. To counter both the unfounded narratives of techno-optimism and the universalizing critique of technology, we discuss an approach to data and networks that enables a situated critique of datafication and correlationism from within.
Media architecture community systematically explores the potentials of computation and digital me... more Media architecture community systematically explores the potentials of computation and digital media to intervene in form-finding, fabrication of buildings and urban data collection processes. Combining social media topic modelling techniques with the review of media architecture-related literature, I discuss methods to locate the media architecture community in social media, conduct initial discourse analysis and pursue a deeper investigation of the topics addressed by community. In the literature, media architecture is presented as an interactive set of technologies for a participative public life. And yet, while a dynamic facade increases possibilities for participation and creative expression, it also facilitates reframing participation as a technical problem. I position optimization and efficiency in media architecture discourse as a form of optimism and offer insights into its political implications. I propose to rethink the shortcut between optimism and optimization by tracing conceptual and professional relations that inform media architecture.
Proceedings of the Weizenbaum Conference 2022: Practicing Sovereignty - Interventions for Open Digital Futures, 2023
Whether we are discussing measures in order to "flatten the curve" in a pandemic or what to wear ... more Whether we are discussing measures in order to "flatten the curve" in a pandemic or what to wear given the most recent weather forecast, we base arguments on patterns observed in data. This article presents an approach to practicing ethics when working with large datasets and designing data representations. We programmed and used web-based interfaces to sort, organize, and explore a community-run archive of radio signals. Inspired by feminist critique of technoscience and recent problematizations of digital literacy, we argue that one can navigate machine learning models in a multi-narrative manner. We hold that the main challenge to sovereignty comes from lingering forms of colonialism and extractive relationships that easily move in and out of the digital domain. Countering both narratives of techno-optimism and the universalizing critique of technology, we discuss an approach to data and networks that enables a situated critique of datafication and correlationism from within
MATTER: Journal of New Materialist Research, Feb 25, 2022
This article presents a new materialist approach to artificial neural networks, based on experime... more This article presents a new materialist approach to artificial neural networks, based on experimental research in categorization of data on radio signals. Picking up on Rossi Braidotti's nomadic theory and a number of new materialist perspectives on informatics, the article presents identification of radio signals as a process of articulating identities with data: nomadic identities that are informed by all the others, always established anew. As a resistance to the dominant understanding of data as discreet, the experiments discussed here demonstrate a way to work with a digital archive in a materialist and non-essentialist way. The output of experiments, data observatories, shows the capacity of machine learning techniques to challenge fixed dichotomies, such as human/nature, and their role in the way we think of identities. A data observatory is a navigation apparatus which can be used to orient oneself in the vast landscape of data on radio transmissions based on computable similarity. Nomadic identities render materiality of radio signals as digital information.
This text is a parable on extinction and pollution and how they can be measured. In her recent ar... more This text is a parable on extinction and pollution and how they can be measured. In her recent artwork Inanimate Species, Joana Moll expresses extinction and pollution quite literally in terms of analogy: the encroachment of microchips is compared to the extinction of insects. The comparison between these two visually similar groups of beings is a measure of artificiality of pollution, as well as of inherent inconsistencies in methods of measurement. The attempt to taxonomize microchips following the rules of taxonomy for living organisms – an already artificial method applied to nature – suggests a possible way of forging an agreement on shared measures and values.
Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology, May 1, 2018
Work in a (feminist) hackerspace relies on the circulation of knowledge and availability of hardw... more Work in a (feminist) hackerspace relies on the circulation of knowledge and availability of hardware. In contemporary maker scene, the majority of these resources is created in male-dominated circles and handed over to female identified makers to act upon and appropriate. Attempts to reconcile the disbalance in gender participation with pink-colored microcontrollers only reinforced existing gender and cultural stereotypes. Instead of adding to the growing voice of critique of exclusionist and inclusionist practices, we take a critical stand towards feminist hacking practice itself: we look at what is produced by feminist hackerspaces. Using standpoint theory to analyze the experience of working with one particular self-organized group of feminist artists and developers, this paper looks at practice in feminist hackerspaces as a way to create and share essential infrastructure with female or transgender identified makers. We analyze patterns of mutual self-help through sharing and learning, and their role in creating feminist infrastructure.
Work in a (feminist) hackerspace relies on the circulation of knowledge and availability of hardw... more Work in a (feminist) hackerspace relies on the circulation of knowledge and availability of hardware. In contemporary maker scene, the majority of these resources is created in male-dominated circles and handed over to female identified makers to act upon and appropriate. Attempts to reconcile the disbalance in gender participation with pink-colored microcontrollers only reinforced existing gender and cultural stereotypes. Instead of adding to the growing voice of critique of exclusionist and inclusionist practices, we take a critical stand towards feminist hacking practice itself: we look at what is produced by feminist hackerspaces. Using standpoint theory to analyze the experience of working with one particular self-organized group of feminist artists and developers, this paper looks at practice in feminist hackerspaces as a way to create and share essential infrastructure with female or transgender identified makers. We analyze patterns of mutual self-help through sharing and learning, and their role in creating feminist infrastructure.
This article explores the use of agent-based modelling as a critical and playful form of engageme... more This article explores the use of agent-based modelling as a critical and playful form of engagement with cooperative housing organizations. Because of its inherent complexities vis-à-vis decision-making, commoning is a well-suited field of study to explore the potential of humanities-driven experimental design (media) research to provoke critical reflection, problem-finding and productive complication. By introducing two different agent-based models, the interdisciplinary research team discusses their experience with setting up parameters for modelling, their implications, and the possibilities and limits of employing modelling techniques as a basis for decision-making. While it shows that modelling can be helpful in detecting long-term results of decisions or testing out effects of unlikely yet challenging events, modelling might act as a discursive practice uncovering hidden assumptions inherent in the model setup and generating an increase of scientific uncertainty. The project "ThinkingToys for Commoning" thus argues for a critical modelling practice and culture, in which models act as toys for probing alternative modes of living together and exploring the constructedness of methods. In countering late forms of capitalism, the resulting situated and critical practice provides avenues for enabling more self-determined forms of governance.
The challenge of this special issue in finding words and coming to terms with contemporary city a... more The challenge of this special issue in finding words and coming to terms with contemporary city and contemporary politics is amplified by the difficulty to pin point what and where exactly a city is and how can we perceive political activities in its context. We might be better off asking: what is not city today, which place on Earth is empty of city-ness? This special issue presents four contributions that proceed from the panel City, Civility and Post-political Models of Freedom and Conflict panel held in November 2018 as part of the Scaffolds international symposium organized by ALICE lab from the Ecole polytechnique federale de Lausanne, supported by the C I.II.III.IV. A, the Kanal Centre Pompidou, and with the participation of several institutions and university departments from KU Leuven, ULB, TU Delft, and TU Vienna. Without pertaining to comprehensiveness, the present collection captures some points in the debate on city and civility informed by questions that originate in d...
This paper will present learnings from a 4-year SNSF-funded research project (2018-2021), explori... more This paper will present learnings from a 4-year SNSF-funded research project (2018-2021), exploring commoning initiatives through regular exchange with three housing cooperatives from Switzerland. In close cooperation with them, we developed four agentbased models as visions for dividing up work needed to care for common spaces and resources in a sustainable way. We affirm computational modelling as a design praxis that can address commoning as a world-making activity, and explore mechanisms that would challenge or restore the stability of community life simulated in this way. Our models are not to be understood as prediction-oriented systems, but rather as a process of designing thinking tools, or toys by which we are creating ways of being. What kinds of controls can prevent extraction of resources from the community? What personal strategies bring more harmony to the group and how much does individual behaviour affect it? We address these questions and propose some preliminary conclusions about the entanglements of labour with value extraction in commoning activities that are best addressed through stories.
Das vom SNF geförderte Forschungsprojekt ‹Denk-Spielzeug für Commoning› am Institut für Experimen... more Das vom SNF geförderte Forschungsprojekt ‹Denk-Spielzeug für Commoning› am Institut für Experimen- telle Designund Medienkulturen (IXDM), HGK FHNW, thematisiert die Komplexität des nachhaltigen Lebens mit explorativen und spielerischen Ansätzen zur Computermodellierung. Wir arbeiten mit drei Schweizer Wohnungsgenossenschaften zusammen, die Nachhaltigkeit, Selbstversorgung und Nicht-Wachstum fördern. Auf der Grundlage von Informationen, die Genossenschaften bereitstellen, formulieren wir verschiedene Prinzipien in Bezug auf Zusammenarbeit und Entscheidungsfindung und kodieren diese in agentenbasierte Modelle von Gemeinschaftssituationen. Wir verwenden das Modell und seine verschiedenen Erscheinungsformen, um mehr über zukünftige Verhaltensweisen und Verstrickungen in der Gemeinschaft zu erfahren. Wir entwerfen Modellschnittstellen als Denkspielzeug: Artefakte, die es Forschenden und Mitgliedern der Community ermöglichen, zukünftige Strategien zu erkennen. Mit den Denkspielzeugen untersuchen wir die Rolle von Artefakten bei der Schaffung von Wissen.
Measuring and understanding the propagation of wireless network signals in buildings is an import... more Measuring and understanding the propagation of wireless network signals in buildings is an important task for the planning of both architecture and wireless networks. This article documents an approach to understanding the wireless network traffic load in a location-specific manner, based on the users. The traffic counting system enables relating of traffic load (both cellular and Wi-Fi) to a position in space, using Connect or Not smartphone application. Positioning tracking is based on two technologies: Wi-Fi fingerprints, created using existing net- working infrastructure and Bluetooth beacons installed at testing locations. The positioning system is able to track movement through space to a satisfactory level. The system was tested in the context of interactive installations as well as long-term observations of user behaviour in space. These experiments facilitate the conceptualization of a communication landscape, high- lighting the activity of people and devices in the network layer. The system can, thus, be useful for post-occu- pancy evaluations. Moreover, it enables a profound understanding of signal propagation and use patterns in space. We argue that the compound measurement of these two phenomena, which are rarely related, forms a productive base for understanding the relevance of built architecture for the design of wireless infrastructures, and vice versa.
Interaction Design and Architecture(s) Journal - IxD&A, 2017
In this article, we present research on the design of buildings that respond to the performance o... more In this article, we present research on the design of buildings that respond to the performance of wireless networks by use of different materials and human-building interfaces. We discuss the way buildings accommodate propagation of wireless signals and different techniques to make this propagation more relevant to the use and experience of space. Early ubiquitous computing research proposed seamful design of interfaces and services as a way to promote embodied interaction and agency of the user. Contemporary approach to the design of seams aims to promote legibility of interactions with infrastructures. These interactions include connection, use, and quantification of wireless network performance. We review the work in architectural design that specifically addresses building permeability to electromagnetic radiation. We also examine electrical engineering research that explores the development and possible uses of frequency-selective surfaces in buildings. As a result, we make two proposals for the use of wireless networking infrastructure to promote location aware services and the design of connectivity-selective interiors. These proposals incite the rethinking of design and interaction with the built environment in terms of communication infrastructure that it relies on.
Proceedings of the 5th STS Italia Conference : A Matter of Design. Making Society through Science and Technology, Jun 2014
The use of design artifacts in research is a debatable topic which raises important questions abo... more The use of design artifacts in research is a debatable topic which raises important questions about the different approaches to design research and legitimate ways of knowledge production. Research through design normally involves construction of a design artifact, which is at the core of the research process. This paper will outline some characteristics of artifacts that come out
of such research practices, hoping to form a base for understanding the nature of research design artifacts and their evaluation.
We will examine the process of translation from the research question into the design brief, into the prototype, back to the question, back to the prototype; until the design artifact is fit as a tool for research; or is (temporarily) discarded. The artifacts produced in this way do not necessarily serve a utilitarian purpose, but provide an explicit feedback about their use and the experience they invoke. In terms of design, they are like code with a lot of debugging print statements. It possibly never leaves the studio and when it does, different levels of independence from the studio setting and context can be identified.
CHI EA '17: Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2017
The integration of architecture and digital technologies happens on an instrumental level, where ... more The integration of architecture and digital technologies happens on an instrumental level, where digital is associated with making the design process more efficient. Architects commonly report on interaction with computers describing the service software has provided. Computational procedures remain obscured by design outputs. In this project, we propose to critically study the relationship of architecture and technology from a perspective of interaction with digital tools. We propose the use of text-mining on a corpus of architectural discourse in social media. With concepts extracted from this initial step, we will conduct a series of experiments on collaborative qualification using a mobile application. We will show how the challenge of organizing a discourse on computational process in architectural design could involve computation in productive new ways. Finally, we will discuss how these insights could enrich the future development of computer-based tools for design.
Distributed, Ambient and Pervasive Interactions: Understanding Humans , 2018
Reyner Banham, author of The Architecture of the Well Tempered Environment, described two contras... more Reyner Banham, author of The Architecture of the Well Tempered Environment, described two contrasting approaches to natural resources and architecture: massive structure and power-operated environment. The former, he claimed, is never sufficient on its own: we always needed to also include power-operated infrastructures to make buildings livable. A few decades later, moved by the oil crises and contemporary pollution concerns, we began to measure building performance and livability by the scarcity of natural reserves of resources. The sense of scarcity became a major drive in development of technologies to measure and reduce energy use.
Parallel to this development, massive structure and power-operated environments conflated in several ways. We can locate smart building development in this lineage of immixture of power-operated environment with massive structure. Rich data collection from sensors and logging of users actions permit to orchestrate, to a certain extent, the co-operation between buildings and their human users. The discourse on scarcity, however, still haunts the discipline. Scarcity of resources and our attempts to measure them have been a strong drive behind technological developments. This starts to change slowly, with the advances in renewable energy technologies and proliferation of communication networks. By moving away from the scarcity discourse and placing more value on abundance of information, I pertain to address the interplay between user agency and build- ing automation. I discuss three cases of scarcity that can be read in a different key: energy, wireless communication and attention. It is in this way that we can work towards turning mere automation into sophisticated orchestration.
free/libre Technologies, Arts and the Commons Unconference Proceedings, 2020
In 1974, French feminist writer Françoise D’Eaubonne identified two threats to humanity: the dest... more In 1974, French feminist writer Françoise D’Eaubonne identified two threats to humanity: the destruction of the environment and overpopulation (D’Eaubonne, 1974). “Feminism or death”, she proclaimed alarmingly. The oil crisis of the 1970s heightened the awareness of the finiteness of resources (even though their scarcity was artificially generated in this particular case) and fueled a plethora of thoughts about alternatives to the capitalist economic system that was perceived as consumptive of the very energy and human resources it attempted to manage. Even though such counterculture ideas did not gain mainstream recognition, and precisely because they failed to cause deeper changes to the system, similar claims are being made today. The Global Footprint Network estimates that the pace of using resources is alarmingly faster than their regeneration capacity:1 in eight months we use twelve months’ worth of resources. Climate change activists as young as teenagers address political and business leaders at World Economic Forums.2 Commons-based economy and commoning are proposed by many as more stable, resilient forms of governance (Gibson-Graham, Cameron, & Healy, 2013; Bollier & Helfrich, 2015). It is not a surprise that Elinor Ostrom was given Nobel Prize in Eco- nomics for her work on the governing the commons (Ostrom, 1990) right after the biggest financial crisis we experience in recent times (2008). This discourse is often characterized by inflammatory statements. With the current text, I propose to think calmly about burning topics such as resource sharing, collective decision making and the role of technology in these processes. The relationship between commoning and technology is explored here in the scope of the research project Thinking Toys for Commoning, looking into the ways media-based tools, such as computer-based models, can make complex commoning processes not only visible but also comprehensible. The multidisciplinary team gathers around questions raised by both lived experiences of commoning in a community of individuals, and the experimental approach to computer modeling. We explore, expose and make explicit different phenomena related to common living. We collaborate with three Swiss housing cooperatives, probing organizational and communication challenges they face.
Architecturality is a concept that emerged from research into the importance of infrastructures o... more Architecturality is a concept that emerged from research into the importance of infrastructures of wireless communication when experiencing and interacting with our surroundings. The concept affords a comprehensive perspective towards phenomena that occur in the environment and have a structural effect on the way organisations or systems operate. Architecturality is not concerned with how a structure or a system is, but what it does. It can be used to explain the effects of that system on its immediate surrounding, to register the interactions that are taking place. This discussion on spatial effects of wireless connectivity is based on the argument that architecturality of wireless communication infrastructures results from the fact that agency of wireless signals, like that of architecture, can be observed and qualified. Agency is not the most pronounced property of architecture - it is a contested feature and requires complicated argumentation. Nevertheless, I will demonstrate ho...
Proceedings of the 2nd Media Architecture Biennale Conference on World Cities - MAB '14, 2014
ABSTRACT Mobile devices and wireless networks have a prominent place in our interaction with the ... more ABSTRACT Mobile devices and wireless networks have a prominent place in our interaction with the environment and with each other. Like every new technology, it has been a subject to inflated expectations. Scholars, writers, artists and architects have explored how this new digital layer could reconstitute our experience of the ̳real‘ urban world, reconfigure space and finally, recompose social interactions within it. In reality although hardly negligible, its impact has not been that spectacular. In this paper, we will outline a set of design and artistic practices attuned at understanding and articulating the interplay of the social, digital and physical infrastructures. These artistic and design artefacts outline a tangible territory of interactions which contributes to our understanding of the physicality of wireless communication and its coexistence within built architecture. Aesthetic experiments, playful interventions and critical designs all conceptualise interaction with an otherwise insensible infrastructure. We will identify common threads in the ways these artworks manipulate the wireless ̳material‘ with a focus on the underlying motivation and resulting outcomes. Based on this, we will discuss these practices in the light of their relevance for and reference to architecture.
This article presents an approach to practicing ethics when working with large datasets and desig... more This article presents an approach to practicing ethics when working with large datasets and designing data representations. Inspired by feminist critique of technoscience and recent problematizations of digital literacy, we argue that machine learning models can be navigated in a multi-narrative manner when access to training data is well articulated and understood. We programmed and used web-based interfaces to sort, organize, and explore a community-run digital archive of radio signals. An additional perspective on the question of working with datasets is offered from the experience of teaching image synthesis with freely accessible online tools. We hold that the main challenge to social transformations related to digital technologies comes from lingering forms of colonialism and extractive relationships that easily move in and out of the digital domain. To counter both the unfounded narratives of techno-optimism and the universalizing critique of technology, we discuss an approach to data and networks that enables a situated critique of datafication and correlationism from within.
Media architecture community systematically explores the potentials of computation and digital me... more Media architecture community systematically explores the potentials of computation and digital media to intervene in form-finding, fabrication of buildings and urban data collection processes. Combining social media topic modelling techniques with the review of media architecture-related literature, I discuss methods to locate the media architecture community in social media, conduct initial discourse analysis and pursue a deeper investigation of the topics addressed by community. In the literature, media architecture is presented as an interactive set of technologies for a participative public life. And yet, while a dynamic facade increases possibilities for participation and creative expression, it also facilitates reframing participation as a technical problem. I position optimization and efficiency in media architecture discourse as a form of optimism and offer insights into its political implications. I propose to rethink the shortcut between optimism and optimization by tracing conceptual and professional relations that inform media architecture.
Proceedings of the Weizenbaum Conference 2022: Practicing Sovereignty - Interventions for Open Digital Futures, 2023
Whether we are discussing measures in order to "flatten the curve" in a pandemic or what to wear ... more Whether we are discussing measures in order to "flatten the curve" in a pandemic or what to wear given the most recent weather forecast, we base arguments on patterns observed in data. This article presents an approach to practicing ethics when working with large datasets and designing data representations. We programmed and used web-based interfaces to sort, organize, and explore a community-run archive of radio signals. Inspired by feminist critique of technoscience and recent problematizations of digital literacy, we argue that one can navigate machine learning models in a multi-narrative manner. We hold that the main challenge to sovereignty comes from lingering forms of colonialism and extractive relationships that easily move in and out of the digital domain. Countering both narratives of techno-optimism and the universalizing critique of technology, we discuss an approach to data and networks that enables a situated critique of datafication and correlationism from within
MATTER: Journal of New Materialist Research, Feb 25, 2022
This article presents a new materialist approach to artificial neural networks, based on experime... more This article presents a new materialist approach to artificial neural networks, based on experimental research in categorization of data on radio signals. Picking up on Rossi Braidotti's nomadic theory and a number of new materialist perspectives on informatics, the article presents identification of radio signals as a process of articulating identities with data: nomadic identities that are informed by all the others, always established anew. As a resistance to the dominant understanding of data as discreet, the experiments discussed here demonstrate a way to work with a digital archive in a materialist and non-essentialist way. The output of experiments, data observatories, shows the capacity of machine learning techniques to challenge fixed dichotomies, such as human/nature, and their role in the way we think of identities. A data observatory is a navigation apparatus which can be used to orient oneself in the vast landscape of data on radio transmissions based on computable similarity. Nomadic identities render materiality of radio signals as digital information.
This text is a parable on extinction and pollution and how they can be measured. In her recent ar... more This text is a parable on extinction and pollution and how they can be measured. In her recent artwork Inanimate Species, Joana Moll expresses extinction and pollution quite literally in terms of analogy: the encroachment of microchips is compared to the extinction of insects. The comparison between these two visually similar groups of beings is a measure of artificiality of pollution, as well as of inherent inconsistencies in methods of measurement. The attempt to taxonomize microchips following the rules of taxonomy for living organisms – an already artificial method applied to nature – suggests a possible way of forging an agreement on shared measures and values.
Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, and Technology, May 1, 2018
Work in a (feminist) hackerspace relies on the circulation of knowledge and availability of hardw... more Work in a (feminist) hackerspace relies on the circulation of knowledge and availability of hardware. In contemporary maker scene, the majority of these resources is created in male-dominated circles and handed over to female identified makers to act upon and appropriate. Attempts to reconcile the disbalance in gender participation with pink-colored microcontrollers only reinforced existing gender and cultural stereotypes. Instead of adding to the growing voice of critique of exclusionist and inclusionist practices, we take a critical stand towards feminist hacking practice itself: we look at what is produced by feminist hackerspaces. Using standpoint theory to analyze the experience of working with one particular self-organized group of feminist artists and developers, this paper looks at practice in feminist hackerspaces as a way to create and share essential infrastructure with female or transgender identified makers. We analyze patterns of mutual self-help through sharing and learning, and their role in creating feminist infrastructure.
Work in a (feminist) hackerspace relies on the circulation of knowledge and availability of hardw... more Work in a (feminist) hackerspace relies on the circulation of knowledge and availability of hardware. In contemporary maker scene, the majority of these resources is created in male-dominated circles and handed over to female identified makers to act upon and appropriate. Attempts to reconcile the disbalance in gender participation with pink-colored microcontrollers only reinforced existing gender and cultural stereotypes. Instead of adding to the growing voice of critique of exclusionist and inclusionist practices, we take a critical stand towards feminist hacking practice itself: we look at what is produced by feminist hackerspaces. Using standpoint theory to analyze the experience of working with one particular self-organized group of feminist artists and developers, this paper looks at practice in feminist hackerspaces as a way to create and share essential infrastructure with female or transgender identified makers. We analyze patterns of mutual self-help through sharing and learning, and their role in creating feminist infrastructure.
This article explores the use of agent-based modelling as a critical and playful form of engageme... more This article explores the use of agent-based modelling as a critical and playful form of engagement with cooperative housing organizations. Because of its inherent complexities vis-à-vis decision-making, commoning is a well-suited field of study to explore the potential of humanities-driven experimental design (media) research to provoke critical reflection, problem-finding and productive complication. By introducing two different agent-based models, the interdisciplinary research team discusses their experience with setting up parameters for modelling, their implications, and the possibilities and limits of employing modelling techniques as a basis for decision-making. While it shows that modelling can be helpful in detecting long-term results of decisions or testing out effects of unlikely yet challenging events, modelling might act as a discursive practice uncovering hidden assumptions inherent in the model setup and generating an increase of scientific uncertainty. The project "ThinkingToys for Commoning" thus argues for a critical modelling practice and culture, in which models act as toys for probing alternative modes of living together and exploring the constructedness of methods. In countering late forms of capitalism, the resulting situated and critical practice provides avenues for enabling more self-determined forms of governance.
The challenge of this special issue in finding words and coming to terms with contemporary city a... more The challenge of this special issue in finding words and coming to terms with contemporary city and contemporary politics is amplified by the difficulty to pin point what and where exactly a city is and how can we perceive political activities in its context. We might be better off asking: what is not city today, which place on Earth is empty of city-ness? This special issue presents four contributions that proceed from the panel City, Civility and Post-political Models of Freedom and Conflict panel held in November 2018 as part of the Scaffolds international symposium organized by ALICE lab from the Ecole polytechnique federale de Lausanne, supported by the C I.II.III.IV. A, the Kanal Centre Pompidou, and with the participation of several institutions and university departments from KU Leuven, ULB, TU Delft, and TU Vienna. Without pertaining to comprehensiveness, the present collection captures some points in the debate on city and civility informed by questions that originate in d...
This paper will present learnings from a 4-year SNSF-funded research project (2018-2021), explori... more This paper will present learnings from a 4-year SNSF-funded research project (2018-2021), exploring commoning initiatives through regular exchange with three housing cooperatives from Switzerland. In close cooperation with them, we developed four agentbased models as visions for dividing up work needed to care for common spaces and resources in a sustainable way. We affirm computational modelling as a design praxis that can address commoning as a world-making activity, and explore mechanisms that would challenge or restore the stability of community life simulated in this way. Our models are not to be understood as prediction-oriented systems, but rather as a process of designing thinking tools, or toys by which we are creating ways of being. What kinds of controls can prevent extraction of resources from the community? What personal strategies bring more harmony to the group and how much does individual behaviour affect it? We address these questions and propose some preliminary conclusions about the entanglements of labour with value extraction in commoning activities that are best addressed through stories.
Das vom SNF geförderte Forschungsprojekt ‹Denk-Spielzeug für Commoning› am Institut für Experimen... more Das vom SNF geförderte Forschungsprojekt ‹Denk-Spielzeug für Commoning› am Institut für Experimen- telle Designund Medienkulturen (IXDM), HGK FHNW, thematisiert die Komplexität des nachhaltigen Lebens mit explorativen und spielerischen Ansätzen zur Computermodellierung. Wir arbeiten mit drei Schweizer Wohnungsgenossenschaften zusammen, die Nachhaltigkeit, Selbstversorgung und Nicht-Wachstum fördern. Auf der Grundlage von Informationen, die Genossenschaften bereitstellen, formulieren wir verschiedene Prinzipien in Bezug auf Zusammenarbeit und Entscheidungsfindung und kodieren diese in agentenbasierte Modelle von Gemeinschaftssituationen. Wir verwenden das Modell und seine verschiedenen Erscheinungsformen, um mehr über zukünftige Verhaltensweisen und Verstrickungen in der Gemeinschaft zu erfahren. Wir entwerfen Modellschnittstellen als Denkspielzeug: Artefakte, die es Forschenden und Mitgliedern der Community ermöglichen, zukünftige Strategien zu erkennen. Mit den Denkspielzeugen untersuchen wir die Rolle von Artefakten bei der Schaffung von Wissen.
Measuring and understanding the propagation of wireless network signals in buildings is an import... more Measuring and understanding the propagation of wireless network signals in buildings is an important task for the planning of both architecture and wireless networks. This article documents an approach to understanding the wireless network traffic load in a location-specific manner, based on the users. The traffic counting system enables relating of traffic load (both cellular and Wi-Fi) to a position in space, using Connect or Not smartphone application. Positioning tracking is based on two technologies: Wi-Fi fingerprints, created using existing net- working infrastructure and Bluetooth beacons installed at testing locations. The positioning system is able to track movement through space to a satisfactory level. The system was tested in the context of interactive installations as well as long-term observations of user behaviour in space. These experiments facilitate the conceptualization of a communication landscape, high- lighting the activity of people and devices in the network layer. The system can, thus, be useful for post-occu- pancy evaluations. Moreover, it enables a profound understanding of signal propagation and use patterns in space. We argue that the compound measurement of these two phenomena, which are rarely related, forms a productive base for understanding the relevance of built architecture for the design of wireless infrastructures, and vice versa.
Interaction Design and Architecture(s) Journal - IxD&A, 2017
In this article, we present research on the design of buildings that respond to the performance o... more In this article, we present research on the design of buildings that respond to the performance of wireless networks by use of different materials and human-building interfaces. We discuss the way buildings accommodate propagation of wireless signals and different techniques to make this propagation more relevant to the use and experience of space. Early ubiquitous computing research proposed seamful design of interfaces and services as a way to promote embodied interaction and agency of the user. Contemporary approach to the design of seams aims to promote legibility of interactions with infrastructures. These interactions include connection, use, and quantification of wireless network performance. We review the work in architectural design that specifically addresses building permeability to electromagnetic radiation. We also examine electrical engineering research that explores the development and possible uses of frequency-selective surfaces in buildings. As a result, we make two proposals for the use of wireless networking infrastructure to promote location aware services and the design of connectivity-selective interiors. These proposals incite the rethinking of design and interaction with the built environment in terms of communication infrastructure that it relies on.
Proceedings of the 5th STS Italia Conference : A Matter of Design. Making Society through Science and Technology, Jun 2014
The use of design artifacts in research is a debatable topic which raises important questions abo... more The use of design artifacts in research is a debatable topic which raises important questions about the different approaches to design research and legitimate ways of knowledge production. Research through design normally involves construction of a design artifact, which is at the core of the research process. This paper will outline some characteristics of artifacts that come out
of such research practices, hoping to form a base for understanding the nature of research design artifacts and their evaluation.
We will examine the process of translation from the research question into the design brief, into the prototype, back to the question, back to the prototype; until the design artifact is fit as a tool for research; or is (temporarily) discarded. The artifacts produced in this way do not necessarily serve a utilitarian purpose, but provide an explicit feedback about their use and the experience they invoke. In terms of design, they are like code with a lot of debugging print statements. It possibly never leaves the studio and when it does, different levels of independence from the studio setting and context can be identified.
CHI EA '17: Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 2017
The integration of architecture and digital technologies happens on an instrumental level, where ... more The integration of architecture and digital technologies happens on an instrumental level, where digital is associated with making the design process more efficient. Architects commonly report on interaction with computers describing the service software has provided. Computational procedures remain obscured by design outputs. In this project, we propose to critically study the relationship of architecture and technology from a perspective of interaction with digital tools. We propose the use of text-mining on a corpus of architectural discourse in social media. With concepts extracted from this initial step, we will conduct a series of experiments on collaborative qualification using a mobile application. We will show how the challenge of organizing a discourse on computational process in architectural design could involve computation in productive new ways. Finally, we will discuss how these insights could enrich the future development of computer-based tools for design.
Distributed, Ambient and Pervasive Interactions: Understanding Humans , 2018
Reyner Banham, author of The Architecture of the Well Tempered Environment, described two contras... more Reyner Banham, author of The Architecture of the Well Tempered Environment, described two contrasting approaches to natural resources and architecture: massive structure and power-operated environment. The former, he claimed, is never sufficient on its own: we always needed to also include power-operated infrastructures to make buildings livable. A few decades later, moved by the oil crises and contemporary pollution concerns, we began to measure building performance and livability by the scarcity of natural reserves of resources. The sense of scarcity became a major drive in development of technologies to measure and reduce energy use.
Parallel to this development, massive structure and power-operated environments conflated in several ways. We can locate smart building development in this lineage of immixture of power-operated environment with massive structure. Rich data collection from sensors and logging of users actions permit to orchestrate, to a certain extent, the co-operation between buildings and their human users. The discourse on scarcity, however, still haunts the discipline. Scarcity of resources and our attempts to measure them have been a strong drive behind technological developments. This starts to change slowly, with the advances in renewable energy technologies and proliferation of communication networks. By moving away from the scarcity discourse and placing more value on abundance of information, I pertain to address the interplay between user agency and build- ing automation. I discuss three cases of scarcity that can be read in a different key: energy, wireless communication and attention. It is in this way that we can work towards turning mere automation into sophisticated orchestration.
free/libre Technologies, Arts and the Commons Unconference Proceedings, 2020
In 1974, French feminist writer Françoise D’Eaubonne identified two threats to humanity: the dest... more In 1974, French feminist writer Françoise D’Eaubonne identified two threats to humanity: the destruction of the environment and overpopulation (D’Eaubonne, 1974). “Feminism or death”, she proclaimed alarmingly. The oil crisis of the 1970s heightened the awareness of the finiteness of resources (even though their scarcity was artificially generated in this particular case) and fueled a plethora of thoughts about alternatives to the capitalist economic system that was perceived as consumptive of the very energy and human resources it attempted to manage. Even though such counterculture ideas did not gain mainstream recognition, and precisely because they failed to cause deeper changes to the system, similar claims are being made today. The Global Footprint Network estimates that the pace of using resources is alarmingly faster than their regeneration capacity:1 in eight months we use twelve months’ worth of resources. Climate change activists as young as teenagers address political and business leaders at World Economic Forums.2 Commons-based economy and commoning are proposed by many as more stable, resilient forms of governance (Gibson-Graham, Cameron, & Healy, 2013; Bollier & Helfrich, 2015). It is not a surprise that Elinor Ostrom was given Nobel Prize in Eco- nomics for her work on the governing the commons (Ostrom, 1990) right after the biggest financial crisis we experience in recent times (2008). This discourse is often characterized by inflammatory statements. With the current text, I propose to think calmly about burning topics such as resource sharing, collective decision making and the role of technology in these processes. The relationship between commoning and technology is explored here in the scope of the research project Thinking Toys for Commoning, looking into the ways media-based tools, such as computer-based models, can make complex commoning processes not only visible but also comprehensible. The multidisciplinary team gathers around questions raised by both lived experiences of commoning in a community of individuals, and the experimental approach to computer modeling. We explore, expose and make explicit different phenomena related to common living. We collaborate with three Swiss housing cooperatives, probing organizational and communication challenges they face.
Architecturality is a concept that emerged from research into the importance of infrastructures o... more Architecturality is a concept that emerged from research into the importance of infrastructures of wireless communication when experiencing and interacting with our surroundings. The concept affords a comprehensive perspective towards phenomena that occur in the environment and have a structural effect on the way organisations or systems operate. Architecturality is not concerned with how a structure or a system is, but what it does. It can be used to explain the effects of that system on its immediate surrounding, to register the interactions that are taking place. This discussion on spatial effects of wireless connectivity is based on the argument that architecturality of wireless communication infrastructures results from the fact that agency of wireless signals, like that of architecture, can be observed and qualified. Agency is not the most pronounced property of architecture - it is a contested feature and requires complicated argumentation. Nevertheless, I will demonstrate ho...
Proceedings of the 2nd Media Architecture Biennale Conference on World Cities - MAB '14, 2014
ABSTRACT Mobile devices and wireless networks have a prominent place in our interaction with the ... more ABSTRACT Mobile devices and wireless networks have a prominent place in our interaction with the environment and with each other. Like every new technology, it has been a subject to inflated expectations. Scholars, writers, artists and architects have explored how this new digital layer could reconstitute our experience of the ̳real‘ urban world, reconfigure space and finally, recompose social interactions within it. In reality although hardly negligible, its impact has not been that spectacular. In this paper, we will outline a set of design and artistic practices attuned at understanding and articulating the interplay of the social, digital and physical infrastructures. These artistic and design artefacts outline a tangible territory of interactions which contributes to our understanding of the physicality of wireless communication and its coexistence within built architecture. Aesthetic experiments, playful interventions and critical designs all conceptualise interaction with an otherwise insensible infrastructure. We will identify common threads in the ways these artworks manipulate the wireless ̳material‘ with a focus on the underlying motivation and resulting outcomes. Based on this, we will discuss these practices in the light of their relevance for and reference to architecture.
On the Interplay of Images Imaginaries and Imagination in Science Communication, 2022
The imaginary of travelling in data traces interdisciplinary concerns for technical artefacts. Fo... more The imaginary of travelling in data traces interdisciplinary concerns for technical artefacts. Focusing on data collection on radio signals gathered by a community of radio amateurs and enthusiasts, informational tools – ‘data observatories’ – render signals commensurable through their different visual representations. What can pixel distribution in a sound spectrogram tell us about a radio signal? Following Haraway’s insistence on the importance and persistence of vision as an embodied gaze enabling a new doctrine of objectivity, this study proceeds by extracting and organizing radio signal qualities using a machine-learning algorithm to expose them again to the visual faculty of subjective observers. Vision and travel constitute methodical tools to unfold disciplinary concerns starting from specific data in a way that favours interactional expertise.
Visibility haunts our idea of knowledge since early greek philosophy, and has found particularly ... more Visibility haunts our idea of knowledge since early greek philosophy, and has found particularly fruitful ground in empiricism. If knowledge arrives to the mind through sensory experience, that which can be seen can be known; that which cannot be experienced is only to be doubted and debated. Wireless communication signals propagate in waves that are of the same type as naturally occurring radio. The structure and dynamics of production, control and distribution of information in the era marked by “post-truth” and “post-factual” politics, makes it ever more interesting to discuss some of the (mis)understandings of wireless communucation’s materiality, visibility, spatiality. I will unpack some misleading conceptions: that waves are immaterial because they are invisible, immaterial because they seamlessly connect and immaterial due to the scarcity of bandwidth..
Teaching Artistic Strategies. Playing with Materiality, Aesthetics and Ambiguity, 2024
Artistic strategies have a great transformative potential to improving research, teaching, and ar... more Artistic strategies have a great transformative potential to improving research, teaching, and artistic expression. The contributors to this volume show how to unleash this potential by presenting a variety of epistemological experiments at the intersection of artistic research, pedagogy, and innovative practices in art and design education. The diversity of contributions demonstrates the non-exhaustive space for experimental phenomenological adventures. This collection strengthens new communities of educators and researchers in arts and design, whose practices are built on the concept of care as empathetic knowledge production.
Information and data are not synonyms: data (etymologically, the ‘given’) has to be treated, arti... more Information and data are not synonyms: data (etymologically, the ‘given’) has to be treated, articulated, read or deciphered in such a way as to contain information. The sheer amount of data today tends to obscure this important difference between data and information: data is entropic, while information is where this entropy is negated; information is negentropic. An emerging political imperative of ‘transparency’ conflates the abundance of data with an increase in information. Unfortunately, the reverse is often the case: The more ‘data’ is rendered available and passed off as ‘information’ or ‘knowledge’, the more opaque the dealings with ‘information’ become. This is perhaps one of the greatest challenges we face with regard to be- coming literate in the algorithmic and symbolization processes that organize data in our world today—processes we refer to here as ‘ghosts of transparency’. This book is above all about architectonics and communication. What, you may ask, does this have to do with ar- chitecture and urbanism? Data and software are thought to reshape the city, while the word ‘architecture’ refers equally often to buildings and to the organization of computer software and hardware components. With this book, we want to cast a projective space that accommodates various Auseinandersetzungen (settings, or setting ups, articulated dispositions of grounds that are quarrelsome) with implicit and explicit mixtures of these two domains interpenetrating each other. Contributions are short enough to make a point, yet long enough to glimpse the great variety of ‘scales’ of abstractive contemplation that these points index.
The "Unpleasant Design" book is a collection of different research approaches to a phenomenon exp... more The "Unpleasant Design" book is a collection of different research approaches to a phenomenon experienced by all of us. Unpleasant design is a global fashion with many examples to be found across cities worldwide, manifested in the form of "silent agents" that take care of behaviour in public space, without the explicit presence of authorities. Photographs, essays and case studies of unpleasant urban spaces, urban furniture and communication strategies reveal this pervasive phenomenon. With contributions by Adam Rothstein, Francesco Morace and Heather Stewart Feldman, Vladan Jeremic, Dan Lockton, Yasmine Abbas, Gilles Paté, Adam Harvey and many others, the book is in an attempt to recognise this nascent discipline within contemporary design taxonomies.
In this thesis, I investigate wireless communication from an architectural perspective. I am usin... more In this thesis, I investigate wireless communication from an architectural perspective. I am using design prototypes to explore possibilities for interaction and designing with wirelessness in mind. The public primarily regards wireless networking technology as a technical infrastructure that should provide a seamless flow of information across a network of base stations, access points and mobile devices. From this perspective, wireless infrastructure is evaluated in terms of network availability and speed, and is continuously optimised. Researchers explored some other perspectives on wireless communication technology: they used computational spatial analysis to measure signal propagation in space. Some ethnographic studies explored its effect on the use of public space. Wireless connectivity was also explored through the philosophical framework of radical empiricism. All this points to the fact that wireless network infrastructure is a complex topic, spanning multiple fields of expertise and interest (engineering, architecture, urban studies but also sociology and philosophy). It is rarely explored from a plural perspective, as each study typically focuses on the one aspect within its expertise. I propose a more complex view of wireless connectivity, encompassing these different perspectives through an intellectual framework that is based on the notion of architecturality. Architecturality, a property common to all architecture but exceeding the limits of built artefacts, is a measure of the effect something has on the experience of space. Through the lens of the built environment, I expose the complex transactions that take place between networks, people and space. In order to evaluate architecturality of wireless communication signals, I conducted a series of practical design experiments, involving people and interactive installations, and using data gathered from mobile devices and wireless access points. The design of these experiments relies on the principles described by human-computer interaction (HCI) researchers as seamful design. Seamful design reveals underlying structures and relationships behind what appears as a utilitarian infrastructure. The design experiments contribute to the discussion on the use of design artefacts in practice-based research methodologies, thus challenging the different agents of knowledge production and the superiority of established research traditions. The insights gained from this complex examination of wireless networks are important for architectural design, as a way to account more adequately for signal propagation through buildings. The experience of internalising wireless networks in the process of design engenders a designerâs sensitivity towards the presence of wireless communications in space. This sensitivity, similar to the one we have for the distribution of natural and artificial lighting, will be needed in the ever more challenging design of the built environment. The sensible designer can account for, and envision, more dynamic environments that are able to accommodate change and information in completely new ways.
Open Source Architecture book is a collaborative effort to draft a strategy for future endeavours... more Open Source Architecture book is a collaborative effort to draft a strategy for future endeavours on the meandering line between collaboration, technology, networks, labour, design and big architectural ideas. The book itself works as a manifesto and encyclopedia at the same time. Its tone doesn’t hide the fascination with digital prototyping tools, bottom-up networked collaboration, and citizen empowerment. Openly critical of 1960s participation projects and openly in favour of Linux, Creative Commons and Arduino, Open Source Architecture declares a state of change. At the same time it is an encyclopedia of architectural ideas, briskly summarized and put into relationships. From Ledoux, Bentham and Fourier to Le Corbusier and to Gropius, over to Habraken, Alexander, and Parvin the list of examples makes a tangible case for an Open Source revolution. The book follows a classical academic structure, building a context for its argument and presenting a ‘state of the art’ of collaborative design – all of which serve to demonstrate the necessity for new research. It then builds its own value system based on open-source culture and contemporary tendencies in digital fabrication, which all help define the job position for the much wanted Choral Architect.
The symposium aims at creating a place for sharing and discussion on research in architecture an... more The symposium aims at creating a place for sharing and discussion on research in architecture and urbanism, artistic practice and studio pedagogy. It does so by reflecting upon epistemological and cognitive strategies and tools used in understanding and shaping our space, from the immediate human body and its extensions to the territory. As such, the symposium proposes to explore theoretical, practical and ethical connections that link our ways-of-knowing with the ways-of-doing to be desired for a common future.
The dataset is obtained from the Signal Identification Guide (SIGID) wiki, an organized database ... more The dataset is obtained from the Signal Identification Guide (SIGID) wiki, an organized database of information on radio signals. It contains audio samples (.wav, .mp3, .ogg), spectrogram images (.png) and metadata on radio signals in two .csv files. Each signal is characterized by signal type, frequency, bandwidth, modulation type, location, sample audio, spectrogram and a short description. They were received and recorded using software defined radio, and most of the audio samples have been demodulated from IQ energy information to audio. The dataset is created by crawling the SIGID wiki website to gather the data on known and unknown signals, updated last time in February 2021. We include two python scripts that can be used to produce audio chunks and corresponding spectrograms, which were used to train the self-organizing map models in the research projects.
Poster of small master of architecture studio, "Architectonics and Noise" given at the ATTP, TU W... more Poster of small master of architecture studio, "Architectonics and Noise" given at the ATTP, TU Wien in Winter semester 2017.
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Auf der Grundlage von Informationen, die Genossenschaften bereitstellen, formulieren wir verschiedene Prinzipien in Bezug auf Zusammenarbeit und Entscheidungsfindung und kodieren diese in agentenbasierte Modelle von Gemeinschaftssituationen. Wir verwenden das Modell und seine verschiedenen Erscheinungsformen, um mehr über zukünftige Verhaltensweisen und Verstrickungen in der Gemeinschaft zu erfahren. Wir entwerfen Modellschnittstellen als Denkspielzeug: Artefakte, die es Forschenden und Mitgliedern der Community ermöglichen, zukünftige Strategien zu erkennen. Mit den Denkspielzeugen untersuchen wir die Rolle von Artefakten bei der Schaffung von Wissen.
The system was tested in the context of interactive installations as well as long-term observations of user behaviour in space. These experiments facilitate the conceptualization of a communication landscape, high- lighting the activity of people and devices in the network layer. The system can, thus, be useful for post-occu- pancy evaluations. Moreover, it enables a profound understanding of signal propagation and use patterns in space. We argue that the compound measurement of these two phenomena, which are rarely related, forms a productive base for understanding the relevance of built architecture for the design of wireless infrastructures, and vice versa.
of such research practices, hoping to form a base for understanding the nature of research design artifacts and their evaluation.
We will examine the process of translation from the research question into the design brief, into the prototype, back to the question, back to the prototype; until the design artifact is fit as a tool for research; or is (temporarily) discarded. The artifacts produced in this way do not necessarily serve a utilitarian purpose, but provide an explicit feedback about their use and the experience they invoke. In terms of design, they are like code with a lot of debugging print statements. It possibly never leaves the studio and when it does, different levels of independence from the studio setting and context can be identified.
Parallel to this development, massive structure and power-operated environments conflated in several ways. We can locate smart building development in this lineage of immixture of power-operated environment with massive structure. Rich data collection from sensors and logging of users actions permit to orchestrate, to a certain extent, the co-operation between buildings and their human users. The discourse on scarcity, however, still haunts the discipline. Scarcity of resources and our attempts to measure them have been a strong drive behind technological developments. This starts to change slowly, with the advances in renewable energy technologies and proliferation of communication networks. By moving away from the scarcity discourse and placing more value on abundance of information, I pertain to address the interplay between user agency and build- ing automation. I discuss three cases of scarcity that can be read in a different key: energy, wireless communication and attention. It is in this way that we can work towards turning mere automation into sophisticated orchestration.
The relationship between commoning and technology is explored here in the scope of the research project Thinking Toys for Commoning, looking into the ways media-based tools, such as computer-based models, can make complex commoning processes not only visible but also comprehensible. The multidisciplinary team gathers around questions raised by both lived experiences of commoning in a community of individuals, and the experimental approach to computer modeling. We explore, expose and make explicit different phenomena related to common living. We collaborate with three Swiss housing cooperatives, probing organizational and communication challenges they face.
Auf der Grundlage von Informationen, die Genossenschaften bereitstellen, formulieren wir verschiedene Prinzipien in Bezug auf Zusammenarbeit und Entscheidungsfindung und kodieren diese in agentenbasierte Modelle von Gemeinschaftssituationen. Wir verwenden das Modell und seine verschiedenen Erscheinungsformen, um mehr über zukünftige Verhaltensweisen und Verstrickungen in der Gemeinschaft zu erfahren. Wir entwerfen Modellschnittstellen als Denkspielzeug: Artefakte, die es Forschenden und Mitgliedern der Community ermöglichen, zukünftige Strategien zu erkennen. Mit den Denkspielzeugen untersuchen wir die Rolle von Artefakten bei der Schaffung von Wissen.
The system was tested in the context of interactive installations as well as long-term observations of user behaviour in space. These experiments facilitate the conceptualization of a communication landscape, high- lighting the activity of people and devices in the network layer. The system can, thus, be useful for post-occu- pancy evaluations. Moreover, it enables a profound understanding of signal propagation and use patterns in space. We argue that the compound measurement of these two phenomena, which are rarely related, forms a productive base for understanding the relevance of built architecture for the design of wireless infrastructures, and vice versa.
of such research practices, hoping to form a base for understanding the nature of research design artifacts and their evaluation.
We will examine the process of translation from the research question into the design brief, into the prototype, back to the question, back to the prototype; until the design artifact is fit as a tool for research; or is (temporarily) discarded. The artifacts produced in this way do not necessarily serve a utilitarian purpose, but provide an explicit feedback about their use and the experience they invoke. In terms of design, they are like code with a lot of debugging print statements. It possibly never leaves the studio and when it does, different levels of independence from the studio setting and context can be identified.
Parallel to this development, massive structure and power-operated environments conflated in several ways. We can locate smart building development in this lineage of immixture of power-operated environment with massive structure. Rich data collection from sensors and logging of users actions permit to orchestrate, to a certain extent, the co-operation between buildings and their human users. The discourse on scarcity, however, still haunts the discipline. Scarcity of resources and our attempts to measure them have been a strong drive behind technological developments. This starts to change slowly, with the advances in renewable energy technologies and proliferation of communication networks. By moving away from the scarcity discourse and placing more value on abundance of information, I pertain to address the interplay between user agency and build- ing automation. I discuss three cases of scarcity that can be read in a different key: energy, wireless communication and attention. It is in this way that we can work towards turning mere automation into sophisticated orchestration.
The relationship between commoning and technology is explored here in the scope of the research project Thinking Toys for Commoning, looking into the ways media-based tools, such as computer-based models, can make complex commoning processes not only visible but also comprehensible. The multidisciplinary team gathers around questions raised by both lived experiences of commoning in a community of individuals, and the experimental approach to computer modeling. We explore, expose and make explicit different phenomena related to common living. We collaborate with three Swiss housing cooperatives, probing organizational and communication challenges they face.
This book is above all about architectonics and communication. What, you may ask, does this have to do with ar- chitecture and urbanism? Data and software are thought to reshape the city, while the word ‘architecture’ refers equally often to buildings and to the organization of computer software and hardware components. With this book, we want to cast a projective space that accommodates various Auseinandersetzungen (settings, or setting ups, articulated dispositions of grounds that are quarrelsome) with implicit and explicit mixtures of these two domains interpenetrating each other. Contributions are short enough to make a point, yet long enough to glimpse the great variety of ‘scales’ of abstractive contemplation that these points index.
I propose a more complex view of wireless connectivity, encompassing these different perspectives through an intellectual framework that is based on the notion of architecturality. Architecturality, a property common to all architecture but exceeding the limits of built artefacts, is a measure of the effect something has on the experience of space. Through the lens of the built environment, I expose the complex transactions that take place between networks, people and space.
In order to evaluate architecturality of wireless communication signals, I conducted a series of practical design experiments, involving people and interactive installations, and using data gathered from mobile devices and wireless access points. The design of these experiments relies on the principles described by human-computer interaction (HCI) researchers as seamful design. Seamful design reveals underlying structures and relationships behind what appears as a utilitarian infrastructure. The design experiments contribute to the discussion on the use of design artefacts in practice-based research methodologies, thus challenging the different agents of knowledge production and the superiority of established research traditions.
The insights gained from this complex examination of wireless networks are important for architectural design, as a way to account more adequately for signal propagation through buildings. The experience of internalising wireless networks in the process of design engenders a designerâs sensitivity towards the presence of wireless communications in space. This sensitivity, similar to the one we have for the distribution of natural and artificial lighting, will be needed in the ever more challenging design of the built environment. The sensible designer can account for, and envision, more dynamic environments that are able to accommodate change and information in completely new ways.
At the same time it is an encyclopedia of architectural ideas, briskly summarized and put into relationships. From Ledoux, Bentham and Fourier to Le Corbusier and to Gropius, over to Habraken, Alexander, and Parvin the list of examples makes a tangible case for an Open Source revolution.
The book follows a classical academic structure, building a context for its argument and presenting a ‘state of the art’ of collaborative design – all of which serve to demonstrate the necessity for new research. It then builds its own value system based on open-source culture and contemporary tendencies in digital fabrication, which all help define the job position for the much wanted Choral Architect.