First Year Studio : School of Architecture and Landscape : Kingston University : London
project : perform
02
01
01 / 02 : Lars van Trier, ‘Dogville’, 2003
03 : Pablo Picasso, ‘Space drawings’,
photographed in 1950 by Gjon Mili
04 : Jackson Pollock, photographed in
1950 by Hans Namuth
05 / 06 : Ed Ruscha, ‘Thirtyfour Parking
helicopter, 1967
04
03
Lots’, photographed from a
07 : Thomas Eakins, ‘The Writing
Master’, 1882
08 : Thomas Eakins, ‘Max Schmitt in a
Single Scull’, 1871
09 : Vik Muniz, ‘Cloud Cloud’, 2006
10 : 1:1 Notation of a performance at
the Rose Theatre, Kingston,
installed in the Quad, Kingston
08
06
10
09
07
05
University, 2008
002: 003
contrasting – and complementary – aspects: an orthogonal projection showing the
scene in plan view, encompassing written text on the floor plane, and a series of more
traditional cinematic shots narrating the theatrical performance from positions at eye
level. Dogville’s camera positions and cinematic shots exemplify prototypical ways of
explaining and generating space in the mind of the audience: through abstraction and
orthogonal projection from a position of overview on the one hand, and through a
succession of frontal views of the action vis-à-vis the observer on the other hand.
Reading and Perceiving
The plan projection might be considered to be a working tool closely related to
the architectural process, and essential for understanding and making space, for
locating walls, enclosures, thresholds, objects in space, whereas the eye-level
view seems to connect more directly with activity, with dialogue, performance or
with inhabitation, experience and memory of space.
But both modes of viewing, understanding and recording of space are relevant
to architecture: analogous positions and frames of reference were explored and
employed as modes of operation in the last year’s first year architecture course
at Kingston University London. This introduction will attempt to locate projection
and performance as modes of spatial exploration in a broader cultural and
theoretical context.
Sensation and Structure
Andre Coboz, a geographer, has outlined a distinction between landscape and
map with broad implications:
‘The map can thus be seen to be a demiurgic instrument; it restores the vertical
viewpoint of the gods as well as their ubiquity. The landscape, on the other hand,
is visible to man, who can only be in one place at a time, in a horizontal manner,
just as man can only see the world successively.’ Andre Corboz 2
The literary critic and philosopher Roland Barthes has provided a corresponding
analysis of the operation of the Eiffel tower as a viewing instrument:
‘… to the marvellous mitigation of altitude the panoramic vision added an
incomparable power of intellection: the bird’s-eye view, which each visitor to the
(Eiffel) Tower can assume in an instant for his own, gives us the world to read and
not only to perceive; this is why it corresponds to a new sensibility of vision; in the
past, to travel (we may recall certain – admirable, moreover – promenades of
Projection and Performance : Christoph Lueder
In Lars van Trier’s 2003 film ‘Dogville’ 1, the camera alternates between two starkly
Rousseau) was to be thrust into the midst of sensation, to perceive only a kind of tidal wave
of things; the bird’s-eye view, on the contrary, represented by our romantic writers as if they
had anticipated both the construction of the Tower and the birth of aviation, permits us to
transcend sensation and to see things in their structure. Hence it is the advent of a new
perception, of an intellectualist mode, which these literatures and these architectures of
vision mark out (born in the same century and probably from the same history): Paris and
France become under (Victor) Hugo’s pen and Michelet’s (and under the glance of the tower)
intelligible objects, yet without – and this is what is new – losing anything of their materiality;
a new category appears, that of concrete abstraction; this, moreover, is the meaning which
we can give today to the word structure: a corpus of intelligent forms.’ Roland Barthes 3
The widespread acquaintance with views afforded by air travel, but also the ubiquity and
navigability of satellite imagery through Google Earth have made Barthes’ category of
‘concrete abstraction’ ever more pertinent. What is the impact of this overlapping experience
of structure and sensation on architects – and architecture students – reading and making
of space? An examination of traditional devices of spatial exploration and representation,
such as drawing, mapmaking and painting, may provide some clues.
Understanding the world through making
Projection – Picture vs. Sign
Extending Roland Barthes’ distinction between structure and sensation, Walter Benjamin has
commented on drawing and painting as two contrasting ‘sections through the world’s substance’:
‘A picture must be held vertically before the observer. A mosaic lies horizontally at his
feet. Despite this distinction, it is customary to regard the graphic arts simply as
paintings. Nevertheless, the distinction is very important and far-reaching. It is possible
to look at the study of a head, or a Rembrandt landscape, in the same way as a painting,
or at best to leave the drawings in a neutral horizontal position. Yet consider children’s
drawings: viewing them vertically usually conflicts with their inner meaning. We see here
a profound problem of art and its mythic roots. We might say that there are two sections
through the world’s substance: the longitudinal section of painting and the cross-section
of certain pieces of graphic art. The longitudinal section seems representational; it
somehow contains the objects. The cross–section seems symbolic; it contains signs.
Or is it only that when we read that we place the page horizontally before us? … And
is there such a thing as an original vertical position for writing – say, for engraving in
stone? Of course, what matters here is not merely external fact but the spirit: Is it
actually possible to base the problem on the simple principle that pictures are set
vertically and signs horizontally, even though we may follow the development of this
through changing metaphysical relations through the ages? […]’ Walter Benjamin 4
004: 005
Benjamin’s hypothesis is remarkable for its simplicity and elegance, and while discordant
examples can easily be found, the dialectic of the vertical image and horizontal sign
reappears in different guises throughout art history. In one such parallel argument, Svetlana
Alpers opposes conventions of the (vertical) perspective image established by Leon Battista
Alberti to a tradition of (horizontal) mapping that can be traced back to Claudius Ptolemaeus:
‘While Albertian perspective posits a viewer at a certain distance looking through a framed
window to a putative substitute world, Ptolemy and distance-point perspective conceived
of the picture as a flat working surface, unframed, on which the world is inscribed.’
Svetlana Alpers 5
Architecture makes use of the sections through ‘the world’s substance’ and projections
onto two-dimensional surfaces that Benjamin has identified in painting and drawing,
and Alpers in perspective and map. Indeed, along with scale models, sections and twodimensional projections of space – and time – are fundamental to working and thinking
processes established in the architectural profession.
Learning about established conventions of representation with architecture students opens
up possibilities of a critical and productive understanding of these conventions as sections
through space and / or time. Beyond the orthographic projection (2B Scale / 4A Kinetic
Space), this section also can take the form of a script (1B Imagine / Image and 8D Boy meets
Girl), a collage (5B) or a notation (3B One Minute Mov(i)e / 4B Gestures in and of Space /
8A Instant Diagram).
Guest contributors to the course have broadened this discourse beyond architecture,
drawing and painting to include film-making, theatrical performance and surface geometry.
The relationship of drawing and painting, structure and sensation, map and perspective, to
performance and projection is complex. A drawing can record an event, such as listeners’
notations (pp 46, 98, 110, 150), or it could script and direct performances (pp. 14, 108, 116).
A certain affinity may exist between the description of static elements such as walls or objects
in orthogonal, isometric or perspective projection, and the description of time-based activity or
Performance – Operational Process and the Working Surface
The dialectic between the vertical picture, or framed window on the one hand and the
horizontal sign, map or working surface on the other hand, gains further relevance in
attempts to consider and understand the work of Jackson Pollock, who through the films
and photographs of Hans Namuth, has also come to be perceived as performer and ‘action
painter’. The art critic Leo Steinberg has described Pollock’s working process as follows:
‘Pollock indeed poured and dripped his pigments upon canvases laid on the ground,
but this was an expedient. After the first color skeins had gone down, he would
Projection and Performance
performance through script, notation or trace, or the sequential projection of film or storyboard.
tack the canvas on to a wall – to get acquainted with it, he used to say; to see where
it wanted to go. He lived with the painting in its uprighted state, as with a world confronting
his human posture.’ Leo Steinberg 6
The importance of considering operational process in understanding Pollock’s art has been
emphasized by Rosalind Krauss:
‘Certainly this break, this double movement – the rough experience on the floor; the
deciphering on the wall – is reiterated in the observer’s experience in front of the hung
and finished painting. In fact, we can look at Pollock’s paintings as arising from pure
optical sensation. But to view them this way – following his early critics – proves that we
possess none of the keys essential to understanding them.’ Rosalind Krauss 7
Gijon Mili’s photographs of Picasso drawing with a flashlight in space also incorporate process
and performance: the drawing can be seen to represent a figure or alternatively be read as
trace of performance over time. ‘Le Mystère Picasso’, a film by Henri-Georges Clouzot, further
expands on the notion of drawing and painting as performance.
In his analysis of a concurrent – and antithetically related – development within art practice,
Leo Steinberg has coined the term ‘flatbed horizontal’:
‘But something happened in painting around 1950 in the work of Robert Rauschenberg
and Dubuffet. We can still hang their pictures – just as we tack up maps and architectural
plans, or nail a horseshoe to the wall for good luck. Yet these pictures no longer simulate
vertical fields, but opaque flatbed horizontals. They no more depend on a head-to-toe
correspondence with human posture than a newspaper does. The flatbed picture plane
makes its symbolic allusion to hard surfaces such as table tops, studio floors, charts,
bulletin boards – any receptor surface on which objects are scattered, on which data is
entered, on which information may be received, printed, impressed, whether coherently
or in confusion. The pictures of the last fifteen to twenty year insist on a radically new
orientation, in which the painted surface is no longer the analogue of a visual experience
of nature, but of operational processes.’ Leo Steinberg 6
As a record of ‘operational processes’, the flatbed horizontal extends the convention of the
‘working surface, on which the world is inscribed’ (Alpers). But how can this notion inform
thinking about environmental, urban, or architectural situations and processes?
The World as Studio
Environmental Recording Surfaces
The painter and photographer Ed Ruscha replaces the working surface controlled and
manipulated by the artist in his studio with a recording surface located in an urban context.In
006 : 007
his photographs of Los Angeles 8 , the horizontal plane of the parking lot records conditions and
activities: traces of sand indicate wind directions and oil spots attest to the presence of the car.
Ruscha’s photographs invite the viewer to re-read the car park as an environmental recording
device, making visible geometric structure and performance over time.
Material and Recording Surface
Surface patterns can drive the development of a drawing convention. Surfaces such as
water, sand, etc, reflect, visualize, record and even measure otherwise invisible phenomena
such as sound, wind, temperature or movement.
Michael Fried has reflected on depictions of the act of writing and of recording surfaces in
the paintings of the 19th century painter Thomas Eakins.
‘… the basic structure and motifs of the rowing […] allowed a certain relation to writing –
to writing/drawing – to come to the fore. I am thinking in particular of the role of the […]
ground plane in the rowing pictures and of the implicit analogy between that plane and
the horizontal plane of writing/drawing, which in this context must be distinguished
fundamentally from the vertical or upright plane of painting. That is, a principal effect
of the underlying perspectival structure in these pictures is to make us acutely aware
of the surface of the water as an image-bearing horizontal plane.’ Michael Fried 9
Turning his attention to the ‘faint but irrefutable reflection of Benjamin Eakins’ right hand and
cuff from the surface of the document on which he is working’ in ‘The Writing Master’, and
the traces of the oars on the surface of the water in the other painting, Fried establishes a
surprising analogy between two very different activities and the surfaces they are projected onto,
producing traces (signs) as well as reflections (images). The scope of devices and situations
of ‘writing’ is expanded beyond the atelier or studio situation to include the interaction between
performance and surface (or working plane) in dynamic environmental systems and situations.
Michael Fried’s thought resonates with contemporary architectural education and practice,
1 Lars van Trier, ‘Dogville’, Zentropa Productions, 2003
2 Andre Corboz, ‘The Land as Palimpsest’, Diogenes, 1983
3 Roland Barthes, ‘La Tour Eiffel’, 1964
4 Walter Benjamin, ‘Painting and the Graphic Arts’, 1917, in:
‘Selected writings’, edited by Marcus Bullock and Michael
W. Jennings, London, 2003, p. 82
5 Svetlana Alpers, ‘The Art of Describing: Dutch Art in the
Seventeenth Century’, Chicago, 1983, p. 138
6 Leo Steinberg, ‘Other Criteria’, in ‘Other Criteria’, New
York, Oxford University Press, 1972
7 Rosalind Krauss, ‘Emblèmes ou lexies: le texte
photographique’, in Hans Namuth, ‘L’Atelier de Jackson
Pollock’, pp. 15–24. Photographs by Hans Namuth.
8 Ed Ruscha, ‘Thirty-four Parking Lots’, photographed
from a helicopter, 1967
9 Michael Fried, Realism, ‘Writing, Disfiguration: on Thomas
Eakins and Stephen Crane’, University of Chicago Press,
1987, p. 65–66
10 Vik Muniz, ‘Cloud Cloud, Sky over Manhattan’, 2006
Projection and Performance
the idea of the notation at scale 1:1, and with current work of the artist Vic Muniz. 10
im·ag·ine
car·toon noun
verb (used with object)
01 a sketch or drawing, usually humorous,
01 to form a mental image of (something
as in a newspaper or periodical, symbolizing,
not actually present to the senses).
satirizing, or caricaturing some action,
02 to think, believe, or fancy: He imagined
subject, or person of popular interest.
the house was haunted.
02 comic strip.
03 to assume; suppose: I imagine they’ll
03 animated cartoon.
be here soon.
04 Fine Arts. a full-scale design for a picture,
04 to conjecture; guess: I cannot imagine
ornamental motif or pattern, or the like,
what you mean.
to be transferred to a fresco, tapestry, etc.
05 Archaic. to plan, scheme, or plot.
in·ves·ti·ga·tion noun
not present to the senses; use the
into the scandal’ [syn: probe].
imagination.
02 the work of inquiring into something
07 to suppose; think; conjecture.
thoroughly and systematically.
(dictionary.com)
(dictionary.com)
Heath Robinson, Testing artificial
teeth in a modern tooth works, 1938
01 an inquiry into unfamiliar or questionable
activities; ‘there was a congressional probe
Benjamin Robert Haydon, Anatomical
drawing of the hand, 1805
verb (used without object)
06 to form mental images of things
008: 009
Your imagination will be the key to your first architectural project. You are asked
to design and build a device which will protect an egg from breaking. The egg
will be released from moderately high altitude at one of three sites: the stairwell
overlooking the quadrangle, the tower at Knights Park, or Kingston bridge (over
dry land). You will be working in groups of three. Testing of the device at one of
these sites and recording the testing event forms part of the assignment.
Protection of the egg is one of the criteria for success, but you will also get credit for
your protection strategy as such, for imaginative ideas, your tantalizing performance
on site and poetic aspects of your device. There’ll be a wide range of strategies –
we’re looking forward to seeing what you’ll come up with!
Image
On Thursday, 27.09. at 11 am we will depart from the studios at Knights Park and
visit four exhibitions in London, focusing on different aspects of drawing. We
will visit: Heath Robinson at the Cartoon Museum, The Body Politic: Anatomical
Drawings by Benjamin Robert Haydon at the Royal Academy, Drawings for William
Cheselden’s Osteographia, also at the Royal Academy, Drawings from the UBS
art collection at the Tate Modern
There will be opportunities for discussion during the excursion. You should also
bring notebook, sketchbook and camera and take graphic and written notes of
drawing techniques and ways of seeing you find interesting.
You are asked to produce two distinct types of drawings, working individually on
the basis of your group project.
Your cartoon could be a narrative, e.g. using frames to tell a story as it unfolds
over time or describe the testing event from anther angle.
Your investigative drawing could explore the object you have built, e.g. cutting
a section through egg and protection device, or looking at certain aspects in an
analytical way, e.g. textures, mechanisms or structure.
Tuesday, 25.09. 10 am Introduction in the MLT lecture theatre / form teams of
three, team brainstorming sessions, sketching of ideas, tutorials.
Thursday, 27.09. Visit to exhibitions on ‘drawing’ in London.
Tuesday, 02.10. 10 am Lecture: Recording techniques / discussion of recording
strategy and preparation of device and recording equipment / testing and
recording on location with judging by peer group.
1 Imagine / Image : Cartoon and Investigation
Imagine
06
05
02
08
04
07
Taxonomy
03
Object
01
Device
010 : 011
12
Cartoon / Storyboard
Space-Time
13
09
Investigation
01 : Heath Robinson, 1915
02 : Heath Robinson, ‘Learning the
Goose Step’, 1915
03 / 04 : Panamarenko, ‘Helicopter’, 1968
05 / 06 : Panamarenko, ‘Aeromodeller’,
1969 – 71
07 / 08 : Bernd and Hilla Becher,
‘Typologien’, 1990
09 / 10 : William Cheselden,
‘Osteographia, or The anatomy
of the bones’, 1733
11 : Benjamin Robert Haydon,
Musculature and bones of the
lumbar spine, pelvis and thighs,
1805
14
10
12 : Matt Jones, ‘Corpse Bride’, 2006
13 : David Hockney, ‘Noya and Bill
Brandt with self-portrait’, 1982
14 : David Hockney, ‘Merced River
Yosemite Valley’, 1982
15 : David Hockney, ‘Pear Blossom
Highway’, 1986
Hollywood, 1 January 1983
1b Imagine / Image : lecture
16
11
15
16 : David Hockney, ‘Scrabble’,
Todd Couves
Amisha Vekaria, Hannah Shaw
Casey Sole, Aboud Aboud, David Wareham, Michael Ha
Matthew Hine
Peter Obatomi
Hadas Even-Tzur
1b Imagine / Image : studentwork
012 : 013
Narrative : Matthew Hine
Narrative : Amisha Vekaria
Narrative : Matthew Hawley
Narrative : Markos Konaros
Investigation : Matthew Hine
1b Imagine / Image : studentwork
014 : 015
pat-tern noun
The pattern is a form, template, or model (or,
01 a decorative design, as for wallpaper,
more abstractly, a set of rules) which can be
china, or textile fabrics, etc.
used to make or to generate things or parts
02 decoration or ornament having such
of a thing, especially if the things that are
a design.
created have enough in common for the
03 a natural or chance marking, configuration, underlying pattern to be inferred, in which
or design: patterns of frost on the window.
case the things are said to exhibit the
04 a combination of qualities, acts,
pattern. Pattern matching is the act of
tendencies, etc., forming a consistent
checking for the presence of the constituents
or characteristic arrangement: the behavior of a pattern. The detection of underlying
patterns of teenagers.
patterns is called pattern recognition.
05 anything fashioned or designed to serve Patterns are also related to repeated shapes
as a model or guide for something to be
or objects, sometimes referred to as
made: a paper pattern for a dress.
elements of the series. Some patterns (for
06 the path of flight established for an aircraft example, many visual patterns) may be
directly observable through the senses.
(wikipedia.com)
John Conway’s Game of Life
approaching an airport at which it is to land.
(dictionary.com)
016 : 017
Your first year architecture course will – amongst other things – challenge the
ways in which you are accustomed to ‘see’, and help you develop new ways of
seeing and perceiving. Abstraction is a powerful tool which can help you ‘see’
by identifying common characteristics within very diverse experiences.
Many visual or aural forms, sensory experiences, or social behaviour, can be traced
back to underlying patterns. Some patterns can only be perceived and recognized
from a position of overview, others, such as a dent in your bicycle wheel, or music,
play out over time. Becoming aware of underlying patterns and being able to read
and visually describe visual, tactile and musical patterns is crucial for an enriched
and more precise understanding of space.
Patterns can be employed to structure space, organize program and trigger
setting up your studios last week.
Prelude – to prepare for Thursday studio
You are asked to bring to the studio on Thursday, Oct 11th, three specimens of
‘patterns’ you have found and identified. Choose objects and images at three
different scales which interest you, each relating to distinct aspects of sensory
and intellectual experience:
Panoramic
Examples: An aerial photograph, a Google Earth satellite image or a photograph
taken from a high vantage point, e.g. looking at the movement of people and/or
traffic from above.
Strategic and time-based
Examples: Strategic board games such as Go or Checkers, or a rule-based
simulation such as ‘Conway’s life’.
Haptic
Examples: Patterned textiles, fir cone, alligator skin.
Thursday Studio
It is important to look carefully and from fresh angles at the patterns you have
selected. Try to identify the characteristics and qualities that interest you in your
sources. Use these as a springboard for the invention of your pattern. Your pattern
does not have to be a literal representation of your sources, and it does not have
to be a combination of all three – discarding is an important aspect of design.
Criteria
Your pattern has to contain elements both of repetition and variation. You should
identify the ‘core’ sequence of your pattern and be able to explain how this core
is repeated and varied. Think about your field as a sample taken from a larger field
and demonstrate how your pattern might be continued and extended beyond
those boundaries.
In the next stage of the project you will develop and assemble a ‘kinetic field’
based on your pattern.
2a Pattern : Panoramic / Strategic / Haptic
emotions. You have already inadvertently generated patterns in arranging and
04
03
02
Haptic
Strategic
10
09
07
12
11
06
Studio
01
Panoramic
05
Pattern and Scale
08
018 : 019
21
20
Pattern and Performance
13
Pattern and Structure
14
01 : Kingston University, 2008,
Studio 1 – people
02 : Studio 1 – furniture
03 : Studio 4 – furniture
04 : Tabletop
05 : Satellite view Sundarban Delta
06 : Emerging pattern in the game of Go
07 : Machine-made brickwork pattern,
Gramazio & Kohler, 2006
08 : Yann Arthus-Bertrand, ‘The Earth
from Above’, 2003
09 : Cemetary and City
10 : Urban Blocks, from ‘Ladders’,
Albert Pope, 1997
11 : Chris Cobb, ‘There Is Nothing
22
15
Wrong in This Whole Wide World’,
Installation at Adobe Bookshop,
San Francisco, 2004
12 : Bookshelves, University Library
Magdeburg
13 : Abandoned Library in Russia, 2008
14 : Caltin, 2007
15 : Beach furniture
23
16
16 : Yann Arthus-Bertrand, ‘The Earth
from Above’, Dogon village near
Bandiagara, Mali, 2003
17 : Plastic bottles
18 : Doris Salcedo, Istanbul Biennal 2003
19 : The Architecture of Density,
Michael Wolf, 2006
20 : Sound Absorption
17
21 : Artist’s Atelier, Anton Garcia-Abril
& Ensamble Studio, Madrid, 2005
22 : Parking Lot, USA
2a Pattern : lecture
19
18
23 : Airplane Boneyard, Arizona, USA
Leyla Osman
Omar Abduljawad
Zachary Bird
Emma Croyle
Duna Irshaid
2a Pattern : studentwork
Jennifer Bull
Felisha Ohene-Djan
Hadas Even-Tzur
020 : 021
Lee Sawyer
Jack Mousley
Sam Bailey
2a Pattern : studentwork
Matthew Mure
Matthew Mure
022 : 023
David Adler, ‘New Metric Handbook’
Suggested reading
Charles and Ray Eames, ‘Powers of Ten’,
Architectural Press, 1992.
W.H. Freeman & Co Ltd, 1999.
The Architect’s Pocketbook.
Lewis Carroll, ‘Alice’s Adventures in
Leonardo da Vinci.
Wonderland’, Penguin Classics, 1994.
Andrew Crompton, ‘Scale / fractals &
http://www.cromp.com/tess/home.html
Mervyn Peake drawings for ‘Alice’s Adventures in
Wonderland’, Lewis Carroll (orginally published 1865)
grotesque geometry’
l’Architecture, 1950
Experiencing a Prison Van Cell, Royal
Courts of Justice Open Day, 2007
Le Corbusier, ‘Le Modulor’, Editions de
024 : 025
A few years ago Alvaro Siza gave a lecture in London and he was asked whether
he used computers in his office. His answer was that there were 22 people in his
office and 22 computers. He acknowledged that the computer opened up a huge
range of possibilities but stressed that architects had also lost a sense of scale by
working on CAD because of the zoom command. When asking an architect what a
particular dimension was, such as floor to ceiling height, invariably the response
would be to use the measure tool on the computer rather than know it. Siza’s point
was that, notwithstanding the fact that there are thousands of dimensions in a
building, it is essential that we know the key dimensions of spatial experience.
The Brief
To go on an architectural adventure in the 7 miles of gallery space in the Victoria and
Albert Museum in search of 3 key dimensions: small, medium and large (these can be
as big or as small as you like). The aim is to physically and socially experience three
situations at different scales and to accurately measure the key dimension of each.
We want you to be ambitious, curious and imaginative in your approach to finding
these situations and in how your record them. We want you to tell a story about what
you decided to measure, how you measured it and what the relationship between the
three dimensions is. You establish the scale and modulor. We have chosen the V&A
Museum because it is like a small city, full of treasures and surprises that would not be
out of place in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland or the Powers of Ten film by Charles
and Ray Eames. It offers a great opportunity for you to experience objects, furniture
and spaces as well as full-scale casts taken directly from historical buildings around
Europe. You are encouraged to begin to question what effect the scale of an object’s
representation has on your perception, from a ‘ship in a bottle’ to a representation
of the solar system at 1:1 billion. How does scale affect the perception of the
relationship between objects? How do objects and spaces perform at different
scales? Diagrams and representations of the findings should explore these questions.
By multiplying the number of dimensions across the whole year we will collectively
form a catalogue of measures, a ‘new new metric handbook’. The intention is to collect
all dimensions from the smallest to the largest. Start by measuring yourself. What is
your eye height? What is your overall height, your stride, shoulder width, hand, etc?
Tools
Yourself, your colleagues, tape measure, A4 sheet, string, ruler, micrometer,
callipers, mobile phone, shoulders, linked arms, outstretched arms, mug, hug, hand,
stride, laser measurer, sextant, library research, brick counting, rope, hand made
tools, a part of your egg dropping device (such as plastic cups or an egg), etc.
2b workshop Scale : Experience and Measure : Harry Paticas
Introduction
03
07
04
08
05
09
11
10
12
01
06
02
026: 027
15
13
01 : Le Corbusier, Monk’s Cell in La
Tourette, 1960
02 : Le Corbusier, Le Modulor, 1948
03 : Leonardo da Vinci, ‘The Vitruvian
Man’, 1487
04 : Marcel Wanders, Giant Man in
Mandarina Duck Store, London
16
05 / 06 / 07 / 08 : Charles and Ray
Eames, ‘Powers of Ten’, 1977
09 : Sniper judging distance by
American Football Pitch Dimensions
10 : American Football Pitch
11 : Measuring and connecting scales:
Mount Etna, Ortigia and the
Madonna delle Lacrime
17
13 : Spiral Staircase in Istanbul
Modern, Turkey
14 : Cleaning the clock face of Big Ben,
Houses of Parliament, London
15 : Relative Distance between Earth
and Sun at scale 1:1 billion,
18
Zürichberg, Zürich, Switzerland
16 : Street Boat, Mayfair, London
17 : Cigarette Tanker, US
18 : Harry Paticas, Window scale in
relation to the foot, Palazzo
Diamandi, Ferrara
19 : Harry Paticas, Window scale in
relation to the urban block, Palazzo
Diamandi, Ferrara
2b Scale : lecture
19
14
12 : Multiple scales at the V&A
2b Scale : studentwork
028: 029
Michael Ha, Mohamed Elzibair
Hadas Even-Tzur, Jennifer Bull, Ren Tanaka
Aboud Aboud, Omar Abduljawad
Chris Culligan, Sangita Southgate, Harshak Patel, Dean Morley
Peter Bayley,Charlotte Calver
Corvin Medhat
2b Scale : student work
030: 031
ki·net·ic adjective
06 Physics. the influence of some agent,
01 pertaining to motion.
as electricity or gravitation, considered
02 caused by motion.
as existing at all points in space and defined
03 characterized by movement: Running
by the force it would exert on an object
and dancing are kinetic activities.
placed at any point in space. Electric field,
(dictionary.com)
gravitational field, magnetic field.
field noun
01 an expanse of open or cleared ground,
esp. a piece of land suitable or used for
pasture or tillage.
02 Sports. a piece of ground devoted to
sports or contests; playing field.
03 a sphere of activity, interest, etc., esp.
within a particular business or profession:
the field of teaching
04 Military. the scene or area of active
military operations.
05 the surface of a canvas, shield, etc.,
on which something is portrayed: a gold
Klaus Marek, Binary Field, student project
at the University of Stuttgart, 2000
star on a field of blue.
07 Also called field of view. Optics. the
entire angular expanse visible through
an optical instrument at a given time.
08 Electricity. the structure in a generator
or motor that produces a magnetic field
around a rotating armature.
09 Psychology. the total complex of
interdependent factors within which
a psychological event occurs and is
perceived as occurring.
10 Computers: one or more related
characters treated as a unit for purposes
of input, processing, output, or storage
by a computer.
(dictionary.com)
032 : 033
pattern will now become the basis from which you will develop and design your
kinetic field.
Logic of form and motion
Explore the logic of form and the relationship between shape and movement.
Amongst other interpretations, shapes can be read and understood as traces
of motion. The linear movement of a point on a plane will generate a line. A
line or point spinning around a center will form a closed or open circle. Cogs
are illustrations of rotating circles; rolling circles have been used by some of
you in Imagine.
Similarly, shapes with parallel edges could be related to a sled, but also to grooves
created by sliding motion. There are many more relationships between form and
motion to be explored, some of which are very overt – others might be more subtle.
Movement can be repetitive, cyclical, planetary, or linear; it can be simultaneous,
synchronized, or asynchronous. Parts of your field could move in isolation, or they
might trigger the movement of other elements.
Kinetic potential
As a first step, observe and study your pattern carefully and think about the kinetic
potential of its individual elements and the devices needed to actualize that potential,
to make elements move. A linear element could be provided with a groove or a track
and made to slide; a planar element could be provided with a pivot and rotate,
either concentrically or eccentrically; or it could be scored and made to flap; other
elements might become ‘pistons’; or they might fold and unfold.
The pattern and elements you have designed last week have their own characteristic
attributes which suggest particular ways in which those elements could be made
to move.
Motion engineering
The possibilities are limitless. The success of your kinetic field will depend on
your imagination, but also on your ability to precisely conceive, ‘engineer’ and
build kinetic devices in you model. You will have to find solutions that perform
the kinetic operations you need to make your idea work.
Your model has to remain intact and be operational in both horizontal and vertical
orientation, on the table and on the wall.
3a Kinetic Field : 2 1/2 Dimensions over Time
Last week you built a model and made a drawing, based on patterns you have
observed, analyzed, selected and developed into a field. Your model, drawing, and
05
15
14
Pattern over Time – Musical
04
03
09
08
13
12
Pattern over Time – Strategic
02
01
Pattern over Time – Musical
07
11
06
Inhabited Pattern
10
034: 035
16
17
Pattern over Time – Interactive
01 : Position in the game of Go
02 : Position in simulation ‘John
Conway’s Game of Life’
03 : Musical Notation of ‘Fantasie
Impromtu’ by Frédéric Chopin
04: Yundi Li playing ‘Fantasie Impromtu’
05: The principle of the Player Piano Roll
06 : Blueprint of untitled piano roll
composition by Bruce Goff, n.d.
07 / 08 : Visualization of ‘Fantasie
Impromtu’
09 : Earle Brown, score for ‘December
1952’
10 : Allotments in New Jersey
11 : Bookshelves
18
12 : Demolition in airplane boneyard,
Arizona, USA
13 : Players on basketball courts
14 : Junkyard in Massachusetts, USA
15 : Philadelphia Highway
16 : Lively Arts, David Hockney’s
swimming pools, and
19
photographic works, BBC, 1981
17 : Perforated screen, Gramazio
& Kohler, 2006
18 / 19 / 20 : Projection on the
windscreen of London bus, film
The Game of Life is a cellular automaton devised by the British
mathematician John Horton Conway in 1970. It is the best-known
example of a cellular automaton. The ‘game’ is actually a
zero-player game, meaning that its evolution is determined
by its initial state, needing no input from human players.
One creates an initial configuration and observes how it evolves.
A piano roll is the music storage medium used to operate the
player piano, pianola or a reproducing piano. A piano roll is a roll
of paper with perforations (holes) punched in it. The position and
length of the perforation determines the note played on the piano.
The piano roll moves over a device known as the ‘tracker bar’,
which has 88 holes (generally, one for each piano key). When a
perforation passes over the hole, the note sounds. (Wikipedia)
3a Kinetic Field : lecture
20
by the author
Sangita Southgate
Thomas Haworth
David Wareham
David Wareham
3a Kinetic Field : studentwork
Jennifer Bull
036: 037
Carmen Po
Yang Yang Hui
Daniel Konteh
Yang Yang Hui
Chris Makariou
Zachary Bird
3a Kinetic Field : studentwork
Juliana Hunt
038: 039
move verb (used without object)
06 to take action; proceed.
01 to pass from one place or position
(dictionary.com)
to another.
02 to go from one place of residence to
another: They moved from Tennessee
to Texas.
03 to advance or progress: The red racing
car moved into the lead.
04 to start off or leave: It’s time to be moving.
05 to transfer a piece in a game, as chess
or checkers.
09 to be active in a particular sphere: to
move in musical society.
min·ute noun
01 A unit of time equal to 60 seconds.
02 A unit of angular measurement equal
to one sixtieth of a degree, or 60 seconds.
Also called minute of arc.
03 A measure of the distance one can cover
in a minute: lives ten minutes from school.
04 A short interval of time; moment.
05 A specific point in time: Stop that
this minute!
(American Heritage Dictionary)
040: 041
in space during the span of one minute. The route you choose should contain
changes in:
•level:viasteps,stairs,escalator,elevator,Ferriswheel,etc.
•speed: accelerating, stepping of an escalator, moving from a ramp to a stair etc.
•space:enteringastairwell,steppingoutofatunnel,intothelight,etc.
Changes could occur either separately or simultaneously. You should think about
how you set up, move (or keep still) the camera during your One Minute Mov(i)e.
On Tuesday, Nov 30, we will screen and review your films / image series. You
will then be asked to produce a notation (this drawing type will be explained in
Tuesday’s lecture)
3b workshop One Minute Mov(i)e : Speed and Space
Working in groups of four, you are asked to record a group member’s movement
02
01 : Great Wall of China, 2007
02 : Beijing Intersection, 2007
3b One Minute Mov(i)e : lecture
01
042: 043
Carmen Po, Yang Yang Hui
Carmen Po, Yang Yang Hui
3b One Minute Mov(i)e : studentwork
044: 045
Hadas Even-Tzur, Ren Tanaka, Susan Amiri
Hadas Even-Tzur, Ren
Tanaka, Susan Amiri
3b One Minute Mov(i)e : studentwork
046: 047
phe·nom·e·non noun
02 Astronomy: the apparent displacement
01 a fact, occurrence, or circumstance
of a celestial body due to its being observed
observed or observable: to study the
from the earth instead of from the sun.
phenomena of nature.
02 something that is impressive or
extraordinary.
03 an appearance or immediate object
of awareness in experience
per·spec·tive noun
01 a technique of depicting volumes and
spatial relationships on a flat surface.
02 a picture employing this technique,
esp. one in which it is prominent: an
par·al·lax noun
architect’s perspective of a house.
01 the apparent displacement of an o
03 the state of one’s ideas, the facts
bserved object due to a change in the
known to one, etc., in having a meaningful
position of the observer.
interrelationship.
(dictionary.com)
048 : 049
contain underground cavities, interior voids as well as intermediate zones.
Sketch and draw a simple, diagrammatic section through the model of the
kinetic field you built in the previous week. Your model is at scale 1:100.
Identify a memorable space within your kinetic field. Set up a viewpoint in that
space and draw a perspective view from that vantage point.
Think about the changes that will occur when its elements move over time. How
will those changes affect your view and space? Kinetic elements could obscure
or reveal scenes, e.g. operating as sliding or pivoting screens; or the position
of the observer might shift along with a kinetic element he is standing or sitting
on – and a sight is gained, lost, or altered. Show the changes in a second
perspective relating to the first one.
4a Kinetic Space : Phenomenon / Parallax / Perspective
Consider and reflect on your kinetic field as space: it might be a landscape,
05
07
12
04
03
02
10
09
Narrative
01
Space
06
11
Kinetic Space
08
050: 051
13
14
15
01 : Stephen Croucher, Pilgrim’s
Gateway to Canterbury, 2006
02 / 03 / 04 / 05 : Forbidden City,
16
Beijing, 2007
06 / 07 : Space and Light
08 : Jesus Soto, Penetrable Azul,
Buenos Aires, 1999
09 / 10 : Jesus Soto, Penetrable
Amarillo, Museo de Arte Moderno
Jesús Soto, Ciudad Bolivar,
Venezuela, 1999
patches of sunlight, 2003
13 / 14 : Gerrit Rietvelt, Schröder
House, Utrecht, 1924
15 : Wolfram Popp, Estradenhaus at
Choriner Strasse, Berlin, 1998
16 / 17 : Steven Holl and Vito Acconci,
Storefront for Art and Architecture,
New York, 1993
4a Kinetic Space : lecture
17
11 / 12 : University Library Magdeburg,
Matthew Hine
Matthew Hine
Jennifer Bull
4a Kinetic Space : studentwork
Marina Polycarpou
052 : 053
Kathy Hui
Tom Larsson
Sam Bailey
Chris Brooker
Sangita Southgate
4a Kinetic Space : studentwork
Robyn Jones, Carmen Po, Yang Yang Hui
Aboud Aboud
054: 055
theatre noun
gesture noun
01 a building in which plays and other
01 a movement of part of the body to
dramatic performances are given.
express an idea or meaning.
02 the writing and production of plays.
02 an action performed to convey one’s
03 a play or other activity considered
feelings or intentions.
in terms of its dramatic quality.
03 an action performed for show in the
04 (also lecture theatre) a room for
knowledge that it will have no effect.
lectures with seats in tiers.
(dictionary.com)
05 Brit. an operating theatre.
06 the area in which something happens:
a theatre of war.
07 before another noun (of weapons)
Oskar Schlemmer, ‘Ring dance’
Oskar Schlemmer, ‘Man’, mixed media, 1928
intermediate between tactical and strategic.
open discussions, performances, etc.) to explore several notions of theatre
such as: object and body, ephemeral moments, duration of experience, actorspectator-relationship, significance of text, and scenetic space.
We will work with texts (4 different plays) and objects (whatever is to hand) at
different location within the building, transforming words into actions, materials
into scenes, and thoughts into gestures.
You will need:
•A4padofwhitepapertodrawandwritewhilestanding,sittingorrehearsing
•Pens,pencilsorleadholders
•Photocamera
The workshop will take place on Tuesday, 6th November. We will start at 10 am
in the staff room on ground floor.
Workshop transcripts
Due to its ephemeral nature, theatre is very difficult to document and theoretically
unruly. However, by using means of representation such as photographs, drawings,
text, and notation you are challenged to give it a try. We ask you to produce a diary
of the workshop, notably focusing on transcripts of theatre relevant aspects such
as space, movement and event / sensation.
Your diary should have the following structure:
1. Title
Give your diary a title (you may choose to do this as the last step after recording
what has happened during the day)
2. Setting
Give a verbal description of the staff room where the workshop starts
3. Transcript A: Actor’s perspective
Choose a scene of the performance and document it from the actor’s point
of view
4. Transcript B: Spectator’s perspective
Choose a scene of the performance and document it from the spectator’s
point of view
5. Transcript C: Event notation
Document the sequence of events during the course of the workshop. Focus
on aspects such as type of action, location, sensation, tension and set these
into relation with time and duration
6. Transcript D: Singular Moment
Choose a particular moment during a performance and document it
4b workshop Theatre /Gestures of and in Space : Kwong Loke & Uwe Schmidt-Hess
The workshop is conceived as a journey with changing vehicles (talks, games,
06
01
Energetic spaces. Scenes of theatre
performances directed by Kwong
Loke:
01 : Lee Man-Hee, ‘Darkness in a
Wooden Bell’
02 : Yu Miri, ‘Festival for the Fish’
03 / 04 / 05 / 06 / 07: Nelson Rodrigues,
07
02
‘Our Lady of the Drowned’
08 : Elangovan, ‘DOGS’
09 / 10 : Nelson Rodrigues, ‘All nudity
09
10
08
04
05
03
shall be punished’
058 : 059
05
01
Elastic spaces. The human body
and the fluctuating boundaries
of this territory:
01 : Antony Gormley, ‘Capacitor’, 2001
02 : Antony Gormley, ‘Freefall’, 2007
03 : Antony Gormley, ‘Flare’, 2007
06
02
04 : Antony Gormley, ‘Static’, 2007
05 / 06 : Gordon Matta-Clark, Arrows,
1973–1974
07 : Oskar Schlemmer, ‘man and
artificial figure’, 1925
08 : Gianni Colombo, ‘Elastic Space’, 1967
07
08
4b Theatre / Gestures of and in Space : lecture
09
04
03
09 : Trisha Brown, ‘Leaning Duets’, 1970
staging the plays
in the evening
more morning exercise pictures
the human machine
Zachery Bird
4b Theatre / Gestures of and in Space : studentwork
060 : 061
Matthew Hawley
4b Theatre / Gestures of and in Space : studentwork
062 : 063
ne·go·ti·ate
nav·i·gate verb (used with object)
verb (used without object)
01 to move on, over, or through (water, air, or
01 to deal or bargain with another or others,
land) in a ship or aircraft: to navigate a river.
as in the preparation of a treaty or contract
02 to direct or manage (a ship, aircraft,
or in preliminaries to a business deal.
verb (used with object)
02 to manage; transact; conduct: He
negotiated an important business deal.
03 to move through, around, or over in
a satisfactory manner: to negotiate a
difficult dance step without tripping:
to negotiate sharp curves.
Environmental Notation of a market in
Beijing by students from CAFA, 2007
(dictionary.com)
or guided missile) on its course.
03 to ascertain or plot and control the
course or position of (a ship, aircraft, etc.).
04 to walk or find one’s way on, in, or
across: It was difficult to navigate the stairs
in the dark.
(dictionary.com)
064 : 065
spatial zones as an urban project and develop a trajectory of experience and
system of circulation.
Negotiate
You will work in groups of four and arrange your individual models to form a larger
field and then enter collaborative negotiations with the aim of establishing a
masterplan and a common system of circulation connecting your parcels. The
connections can take a wide range of forms, intensities, and urban typologies,
from underground passage, bridge, path, avenue, axis, to public plaza and beyond.
Navigate
Your trajectories and circulation network should then be developed to
provide access to and enhance the characteristic qualities of your field. Think
about the experience of the traveler along the route / the overall configuration
of the system.
Urban Structure
You could develop a linear promenade, or a grid-like network, or a tree-like,
hierarchical system of paths – or a hybrid configuration. Consider the
development of nodes and how you will overcome differences in levels.
The degree of connectivity can range from hyper-connected to minimal; you
can provide a vast number of connections with a high degree of redundancy
and alternative routes or highly controlled linear sequences.
Urban Experience
Think about the One Minute Mov(i)e you have made and the films you have
seen last Tuesday. Elements of urban experience recorded there could help
you to invent and develop urban experience(s) in your field.
•transitionsbetweenspaces
•changesinlevel
•therhythmofmovement
•changesinspeed
•directionaltrajectories,shortcutsandramblingdetours
•thepostureofthehumanbodyinmovement
•running,walking,racing,standingstill
•theinteractionbetweenpeopleatnodesandintersections
•differentvehiclesandtheircharacteristicmovementpatterns
5a Negotiate / Navigate : Dynamic Urbanism
This stage of the project challenges you to think about your kinetic field and
06
15
05
14
04
13
03
02
09
08
12
11
Negotiation
01
07
Navigation
10
066 : 067
20
Case Studies
16
01 : Sarah Wigglesworth, ‘Table top’,
1998
02 : Georg Gerster, ‘Swissair poster
for Hong Kong’, 1975
03 : Yann Arthus-Bertrand, ‘The Earth
from Above’, Cotton fabrics drying
in the sun, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India,
21
17
2003
04 : ibid, Carpets in Marrakech,
Morocco
05 : ibid, Facade in Sao Paulo, Brasil
06 : Army Corps of Engineers, ‘The
Mississippi river in its geological
context’, USA, 1974
07 : Yann Arthus-Bertrand, ‘The Earth
22
18
from Above’, Village in the Rheris
valley, Ar-Rachidia region, Haut
Atlas, Marocco
08 : ibid, Dogon village near
Bandiagara, Mali
09 : Oasis in the Sahara
10 : Ice skaters in the Netherlands
12 : Susken Rosenthal, Football
drawings, 1982
13 : Stamen, Cabspotting, San
Francisco, 2006
14 : Emmet Gowin, ‘Harvest Traffic
over agricultural pivot near
Hermiston’, Orgeon, 1991
15 : Emmet Gowin, ‘Mining Exploration
near Carson City’, Nevada, 1988
16 : Emmet Gowin, ‘Off Road Traffic
Pattern along Northwest Shore of
the Great Salt Lake’, Utah, 1988
17 : Saul Steinberg, ‘Country Noises’,
1979
18 : Formula 1 racetrack in Bahrain,
2004
19 : Highway Intersection, USA
20 : George Steinmetz, ‘Hakka village
in Guandong’, China, 2008
21 : ibid, ‘Suburban development
in Shenyang’, China, 2008
22 : Newcourt’s Map of Medieval
London, 1658
5a Negotiate / Navigate : lecture
19
11 : Football field
Laura Berge, Tom Haworth, Sarah Henry, Hannah Shaw Zachary Bird, Cara Beveridge, Emily Hilliar, Jamie Mitchell
Michael Hoang, Matthew Kwok,
Hadas Even-Tzur, Ren Tanaka
5a Negotiate / Navigate : studentwork
068: 069
Cagla Guvec, Shoreen Lobban,
Corvin Medhat, Felisha Ohene-Djan
Robert Whitten, Emma Rowland,
Matthew Hine, Dean Morley
David Wareham, Michael Ha,
Caroline Lozynskyj, Casey Sole
5a Negotiate / Navigate : studentwork
Seetal Patel, Natalia Rzepka, Amra Naim
070 : 071
col-lage noun
References
An art form in which, variously, small objects, Pablo Picasso, Kurt Schwitters, Max Ernst,
bits of newspaper, cloth, pressed flowers,
Marcel Duchamp, Hannah Hoech, John
etc. are pasted together on a surface in
Heartfield, Eduardo Paolozzi, Richard
incongruous relationship for their symbolic
Hamilton, Ron Herron (Archigramm),
or suggestive effect a composition so made
Adolfo Natalini (Superstudio), Hans
any collection of seemingly unrelated bits
Hollein, Yves Brunier, Richard Meier
and parts, as in a photomontage.
Superstudio, ‘Continuous Monument’, 1999
(dictionary.com)
072 : 073
From the seminal moment in 1908 when the young Picasso took a piece of
brown card pasted with ‘Magasins du Louvre’ label and converted it into a new
kind of picture, collage has been at the very heart of modern art and architecture.
Collages are an intuitive method of designing and expressing architectural
processes. They can become a very personal way of expressing oneself. Artists
and architects have used collages, whether hand-made or digitally composed,
to express their ideas and designs.
In this one-day-workshop we will explore some methods of hand-made collages,
for example where to find raw-material and images, cut-and-paste techniques,
(re)arrangement of found objects, etc. You will learn to compose an image out
of unrelated parts and how to invent a new meaning for everyday objects.
You will need to bring the following materials and tools
•Oneoldnewspaper
•Aphotoofyouandonephotoofoneofyourirstyear-projects
•Drawing board, a set of pencils or lead holders with leads , pencil colours, small
scissors, cutter, scalpel and nail scissors, a cutting mat, Blu Tack, glue stick
Test I: Collage – Colour
In the product catalogues and the newspapers you will find all kind of coloured
areas and objects. Start your first collage with an exciting arrangement of different
colours and patterns.
Test II: Collage – Scale
With this collage you will compose a scenario of absurd scale shifts. Use 3–5
different scales to build up a relationship between the chosen objects, e.g.
a person with a hand as big as a house next to it. Remember what you have
discovered in the V&A museum, whilst measuring different scales.
Test III: Collage – Function
Set up a collage to show a device which can move or which can be moved.
The result could be a small part of an invented machine or an unusual way to
use an everyday object like an iron, a washing machine, a screw driver.
A storage device for nightmares
Every one of us dreams at night: if long or short, colorful or black-and- white, sunny
or dark, happy or scary. With a storage device for nightmares you could file your
personal dreams every day and store them safe and protected. You will start with your
photo and use all 3 methods from the morning session in order to collage your device.
5b workshop Collage : Markus Seifermann
•Oneproductcatalogueforfree(Argos,Boots,Franchi-ironmongeryetc.)
the tobacco smoke
also smells
of the mouth
that exhales it
the two odors
04
are married by
the INFRA-slim
06
07
08
01
02
03
When
Marcel Duchamp, View 5,
05
no. 1 (March 1945)
074 : 075
14
09
01: Ron Herron, ‘Archigramm Instant
City’, 1969
02: Yves Brunier, ‘Waterloo site
development’, 1989
03: Lebbeus Woods, ‘Quake City /
Shared Houses’, 1995
04: Richard Meier, ‘Collage-Diary’, 1987
15
10
05: Kurt Schwitters, ‘Merz Picture’,
32A (Cherry Picture), 1921
06: Ben Nicholson, ‘Appliance House’,
An Initial Collage, 1986 – 90
07: Hans Hollein, ‘Highrise Building:
Sparkplug’, Project, 1964
08: Ron Herron, Archigramm,
‘Walking City’, 1964
16
11
09: Superstudio, ‘Continuous
Monument’, 1969
10: Ben Nicholson, ‘Appliance House’,
exterior elevation of Cell wall,
1986 – 90
11: Superstudio, ‘Continuous
Monument’, 1971
17
12
12: Markus Seifermann, ‘Spinning
the Story Tissue’, 2005
13: Markus Seifermann, ‘Story
Grinder’, 2005
14: Kurt Schwitters, ‘Merzbau’, 1923 – 43
15: Teddy Newton, ‘Pixar’,
Miscellaneous Superhero, 2004
16: Richard Hamilton, ‘Just What Is It
18
Different, So Appealing?’, 1956
17: Pablo Picasso, ‘Guitar, Sheet Music
and Glass’, 1912
18: Gee Vaucher, ‘International Anthem
2 – Domestic Violence’, 1979
19: Vladimir Tatlin, ‘Painterly Relief’,
1913 – 14
5b Collage : lecture
19
13
That Makes Today’s Homes So
Matthew Hine
5b Collage : studentwork
Alex Larelli
076 : 077
Jennifer Bull
Peter Bayley
Cara Beveridge
Robyn Jones
5b Collage : studentwork
Mickaela Pellett
078 : 079
Urban Animal
Third Nature
Penumbra
Advanced Footwear
080: 081
forwarded message 01
Second Nature Advanced Footwear Ltd, The Chairman of the Board
Dear architect,
‘kinetic field’, which shows much promise of synergy regarding a project we have
been pursuing at our firm. Our company background is in quality footwear for a
range of different sports.
About two years ago, we established ‘Second Nature Advanced Footwear’ as a
new research and development division within our firm. ‘Second Nature Advanced
Footwear’ addresses the needs of a growing number of customers using our
equipment in the urban outdoors. More specifically, we are concerned by the rising
incidence of arthropathy and believe that in order for us to be able to conduct our
business responsibly, rigorous research into urban surfaces and their interaction
with the urban athlete’s footwear will be essential.
We would like to ask you to design a small enclosed space within your ‘kinetic field’
to accommodate a member of our staff, who will be on site to receive visiting athletes
and testers and supply them with our experimental sports shoes.
Sincerely, Second Nature Advanced Footwear Ltd
forwarded message 02
Penumbra Ltd, The Chairman of the Board
Dear architect,
Your recent work on your evolving ‘kinetic field’ has caught our interest.
We are an interdisciplinary team of perception psychologists and lighting designers.
Sunlight, daylight and artificial light are the media we work in.
We would like to approach your with the idea of establishing a showcase and
research location for our team in your ‘kinetic field’. For this, we will require a small,
enclosed space to accommodate some equipment and a control desk for the
operation of our experiments.
We would like to work with sunlight, daylight and artificial light within you kinetic
field. You may consider providing us with underground cavities, but this is not an
essential requirement. Rather, we would be expecting an idea from you to which
we then could react. You should also provide us with some indication and
illustration of possible sunlighting, daylighting, and artificial lighting scenarios
that :could take place within your territory.
Should you be interested in helping us, you might want to take a look at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daylight and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow.
Sincerely, Penumbra Ltd
6a ... a letter from the client : Program and Activity
With great interest we have been following your recent work and your evolving
‘There are people who think what makes a good wine comes from nature – factors
like rain and soil and temperature. Then there are those who think it’s a matter
of second nature – of picking and fermenting and ageing. But these days, there’s
a whole new world of wine making technology – and a whole new argument as to
what is ‘natural’ and what is not.
These days, its chemists rather than vignerons who are increasingly in charge
of technique. It is illegal in the United States and in many other countries to
add flavors or colorings. But it isn’t illegal to add oak chips to wine fermenting
in stainless steel barrels to get that “oak finish” promised on the label.
These increasingly popular technologies shift wine making away from the idea
of a process subject to regional variations in climate and seasonal variations in
weather. Nature no longer rules; second nature eliminates the necessary vagaries
of wind and water and sunshine. While the images and copy on the labels still
refer to the wine makers’ ancient status as an alchemical transformer of nature into
art, the reality is otherwise.
As Guy Debord once put it: ‘An era which finds it profitable to fake by chemical
means various famous wines, can only sell them if it has created wine experts able
to con their marks into admiring their new, more distinctive flavors.’ ‘Whenever
people lose the capacity to see things for themselves, the expert is there it offer
an absolute reassurance’, Debord says. In the case of wine, the media shifts from
representing the gold standard in taste to creating a floating currency of value.
Wine, once a liminal product, hovering on the border between nature and second
nature, between the world of wind and rain and the world of collective human
labor and skill, becomes an index of a further development in the human relation
to nature – the development of ‘third nature’.
It is only when second nature develops that nature appears as a concept. Once
the techniques are in place for making nature into a resource, for trapping or
taming it, an appreciation arises for nature in its raw state, a state that only appears
at the point where it is no longer a general condition. What cultures represent to
themselves as nature is always a world we have lost. Nature, which appears as
an origin, appears only retroactively, as it disappears.
The lost world of nature exercises a magic fascination over culture, which
expresses itself in its finest form as romanticism. But it also expresses itself as
a consumer preference, for that which is close to nature, for that which, while
produced, exposes itself in its production to the serendipity of wind and rain.
In spite of the fashion for organic foods and herbal remedies, the most enduring
product of this hankering for a lost nature is wine.
[...] Wine becomes an artifact of third nature, of the management of appearances,
the valuation of signs, a third nature capable of transforming any product of second
nature’s industrial ingenuity into the sign of its opposite.’
(http://amsterdam.nettime.org/Lists-Archives/nettime-l-0108/msg00115.html)
082 : 083
forwarded message 03
Third Nature Winery Ltd, The Chairman of the Board
Dear architect,
We are sending you this excerpt from our company manifesto because we would
like to propose a collaboration, We would like to ask you to design a small
enclosed space within your ‘kinetic field’ to incorporate a small bar and storage
facility. The overall floor area of enclosed space may not under any circumstances
exceed 30 m2, but could well be smaller than that.
We envision visitors to enjoy the dégustation of a small range of avant-garde wines
in the context and outdoor spaces of your kinetic field and will expect an innovative
proposition for this from you.
Sincerely, Third Nature Winery Ltd
forwarded message 04
Urban Animal Ltd, The Chairman of the Board
Dear architect,
We are at the forefront of research into the adaptation of species to man-made
environments. Your kinetic field might yet prove to be an ideal tool for our research
as well as our efforts to communicate with the broader public.
Within your kinetic field, we would require a small, enclosed space for members of
our staff overseeing our operations there.
We would also expect you to demonstrate how your territory could provide hidden
spaces (which need not be enclosed), from which members of our staff could
We plan to focus on a particular species of urban animals and will leave the choice
of this species up to you. Previous projects have been conducted on neurotic cats,
migrant birds, and commensals. This is a type of symbiosis where two (or more)
organisms from different species live in close proximity to one another, in which
one member is unaffected by the relationship and the other benefits from it.
Will you help us?
Sincerely, Urban Animal Ltd
6a ... a letter from the client : Program and Activity
conduct their research, observe and record.
15
14
04
03
02
08
07
06
11
10
Narrative and Enclosure
13
12
Space and Program
01
Function
05
Choreography
09
084: 085
16
Making Space at Knights Park
01 : Space and Program
02 : Hayward Gallery, ‘Psycho Buildings
Exhibition’, 2008
03 : Codified Program, Pictograms
04 : Codified Areas, Zoning Plan
05 : Diagram of the Human Heart
06 : Ollafur Eliason, Pavillion for the
17
Serpentine Gallery, 2007
07 : Ernst Neufert, Frequency of use
in different areas of a kitchen
08 : OMA, Urban Design Forum
Yokohama, 1992
09 : Notation of Pageants in medieval
Florence
10 : Hayward Gallery, ‘Psycho Buildings
18
Exhibition’, 2008
11 : ‘Choreography and Enclosure’,
Lars van Trier, Dogville 2003
12 : ‘Narrative and Enclosure’, Umberto
Eco, Floor plan with inscriptions of the
library for The Name of the Rose, 1980
13 : Unprogrammed Field in London, 2007
14 : Olafur Eliason, ‘The Weather Project’,
Tate Modern, 2003
15 : Antony Gormley, ‘Blinding Light’,
Tate Modern, 2007
16 : Common Room, Kingston University:
Discussion at AHRA Conference, 2007
17 : Studios: Presentation at AHRA
Conference, 2007
Can one attempt to make a contribution to architectural discourse
by relentlessly stating that there is no space without event, no
architecture without program?
Our work argues that architecture – its social relevance and formal
invention – cannot be dissociated from the events that ‘happen’ in it.
To what extent could the literary narrative shed light on the
organization of events in buildings, whether called ‘use,’ ‘functions,’
‘activities,’ or ‘programs’? If writers could manipulate the structure
of stories in the same way as they twist vocabulary and grammar,
couldn’t architects do the same, organizing the program in a
similarly objective, detached, or imaginative way?
For if architects could selfconsciously use such devices as repetition,
distortion, or juxtaposition in the formal elaboration of walls,
couldn’t they do the same thing in terms of the activities that
occurred within those very walls?
Bernard Tschumi: Architecture and Disjunction
6a ... a letter from the client : Program and Activity : lecture
18 : First Year Studio Discussion
Charlotte Calver
Matthew Hine
6a ... a letter from the client : Program and Activity : studentwork
086: 087
Hadas Even-Tzur
Sangita Southgate
6a ... a letter from the client : Program and Activity : studentwork
Shoreen Lobban
088: 089
Ejection Loop, Structural Stability
and Morphogenesis, René Thom
Surface differention of detour lines, Jinbok Wee
090: 091
or relative, in various directions; and Growth involves the same concepts
of magnitude and direction, related to the further concept, or ‘dimension’,
of Time.
‘On Growth and Form’ by D’Arcy Thompson; edited by John Tyler Bonner;
Cambridge University Press 1961
Rhino as ‘Generative tool’
Two sessions of Rhino workshop are set up on the continuous track of project
development. 3D development using Rhino encourages you to think your projects
onto different levels as well as to obtain some uses of it. Nowadays, using 3D in
computer is far more than ‘a tool’. It would be rather your another infrastructural
brain to help you to construct the system of form-making and to understand the
complexity of its dynamics.
Advantages of Rhino
3D Modelling adopts your concept and you also need to adopt the computational
algorithm and even its way of thinking. There are many types of softwares
to construct 3D and animation/simulation. Among these, Rhino has its own
conspicuous strengths: geometrical accuracy, calculative stability and surface
manipulations. Nowadays, many engineers also use it due to these aspects.
In addition to Rhino, Maya and 3D-Max are used for some specific uses.
Output from workshops
You will use Rhino not just for making a form but for generating the system of
form. Having said that, all you need to do is indulging yourself into ‘Rhino-World’.
Start with your chosen field or a part of field and then deform/analyse/transform
it. Do not take it serously. Total-fun would be rather productive. At the end of
every session, we will hold a pin-up in studio to see your first 3D outputs. Bear
in mind one thing: 3D information would be sometimes more understandable
than 3D image when it is extracted into 2D vectors.
6b workshop Rhino : Jinbok Wee and Florence Kong
For the form of an object is defined when we know its magnitude, actual
Jamie Mitchell
6b Rhino : studentwork
Jamie Mitchell
092: 093
Sangita Southgate
Lloyd Preston-Allen
6b Rhino : studentwork
Sangita Southgate
094: 095
7a Instant Diagrams : Jacques Tati Notations
7b Field Trip Sketchbook : Persona No.5, The Urban Delaminator
7c Space Syntax : Maia Lemlij
7d Diagrams of Intensive and Extensive Space
7e Scale and Representation : Mark Hatter
7
096: 097
Matthew Hine
Ren Tanaka
Jaques Tati, ‘Mon Oncle’
Jennifer Bull
098: 099
Dean Morley
Jaques Tati, ‘Playtime’
follow their protagonist, Monsieur Hulot, as he navigates vertical and horizontal
space. Please draw an instant diagram noting and explaining his experience and
the incidents which occur along the trajectory of his movement.
7a Instant Diagrams : Jacques Tati Notations
Harshak Patel
These two short sequences from films by Jaques Tati, ‘Mon Oncle’ and ‘Playtime’,
Sangita Southgate
100: 101
information, smear and swab from urban surfaces – this will be systematically
collected in a sketchbook. Thin paper and charcoal / pencil will be used to record
haptic and textural qualities with a frottage technique, or a photo camera. The
Urban Delaminator is especially interested in the story behind and of surfaces, and
in the construction of surfaces, in the elements supporting and making surfaces.
7b Field Trip Sketchbook : Persona No.5, The Urban Delaminator
Istanbul Suleymanie Mosque
Canyon Shopping Centre
Exemplary tools are a broad roll of adhesive film that can pick up particles, traces,
London, St Giles Court
London, Victoria Embankment
London, Covent Garden
Ealing Strategic Centre AAP
London, Tate Britain
London, Aquatics Centre
London, Trafalgar Square
London, Trafalgar Square
pedestrian distribution
Liverpool, St Johns Centre
London, Elephant & Castle
London, Millenium Bridge
102: 103
Jeddah, Spatial Planning
Jeddah, Tyyarah Square
built environment. This influence can be understood in its nature, measured
in its degree and shaped through planning and design interventions.
Space Syntax provides a unique, evidence-based approach to the planning
and design of buildings and urban areas. Our aim is to help create environments
that are socially, economically and environmentally sustainable. Our evidence
and ideas empower people to make informed decisions about the key issues
concerning them.
7c Space Syntax : Maia Lemlij
Jeddah, Masterplan
Jeddah, Masterplan
Jeddah, Unplanned Areas
Glasgow Social Services Buildings
Nottingham Old Market Square
Munich Axial Map
Human activity is profoundly influenced by the planning and design of the
Legend for Group A
104: 105
Alvin
Shuang Zhu
The workshop explored different ways of experiencing the contemporary city,
taking the distinction between extensive and intensive space established by
the French philospher Gilles Deleuze as its point of reference. Extensive space
is ‘bounded by natural and artificial extensive boundaries’, whereas intensive
space is characterized by ‘zones of intensity’. While extensive quantities such
pressure, temperature and connectivity are recognized by Deleuze as ‘indivisible’.
Reyner Banham has made a related distinction between the campfire as the
archetype of ‘power-operated solutions’ (defining zones of intensity) and the
tent as a ‘structural solution’ (defining enclosure and extensive boundaries).
Starting from an image of a hotpot in a Beijing restaurant, students explored
process, mechanics, performance and spatial context.
In a second phase, a temporary market and adjoining traffic intersection became the
site for an urban investigation and environmental notation. The site was divided into
7 strips, with individual groups selecting specific environmental parameters, aspects
and patterns of human behavior to observe, investigate and notate. Individual systems
and codes of notations were developed and explained in a legend.
An Rong, Darren Deane, Christoph Lueder, and Yufang Zhou, Kingston University
London and Central Academy of Fine Arts Beijing
7d Diagrams of Intensive and Extensive Space
as volume, area and length are additive, intensive quantities such as density,
106: 107
The ability to interrogate objects at different scales can be an important design
tool. A child playing with a dolls house or toy fort has no trouble projecting
themselves within their miniaturised environment. Adults, however often have
difficulty with such scalar projection, their continued exposure to the ‘real world’
inhibiting their ability to misread space and distance. As architects we spend
most of our time producing miniatures, both as models and as scale drawings.
they represent.
This workshop focused on the exploration and documentation of architectural
models and found ‘1:1’ objects at differing scales. Students were asked to
produce photographs, images, sequences and films that projected their subjects
to a larger scale. Careful consideration was given to viewpoint, context, lighting,
narrative, depth cues and scale cues. Resulting images were rich and unexpected,
with happy accidents highlighting qualities within projects, and suggesting new
avenues of exploration.
Mark Hatter is an architect, artist and tutor who has explored his interests in the
architectural miniature through modelmaking and film. He has assumed the guise
of a scientist who investigates fairy tales, built miniature film sets in the Nevada
Desert, and taught ants to watch television.
7e Scale and Representation : Mark Hatter
We should strive to see beyond the miniatures we produce to the spaces
per-for-mance noun
06 the act of performing.
01 a musical, dramatic, or other
07 the manner in which or the
entertainment presented before
efficiency with which something
an audience.
reacts or fulfills its intended purpose.
02 the act of performing a ceremony,
08 Linguistics. the actual use of
play, piece of music, etc.
language in real situations, which may
03 the execution or accomplishment
or may not fully reflect a speaker’s
of work, acts, feats, etc.
competence, being subject to such
04 a particular action, deed, or
nonlinguistic factors as inattention,
proceeding.
distraction, memory lapses, fatigue,
05 an action or proceeding of an
or emotional state.
unusual or spectacular kind:
(dictionary.com)
His temper tantrum was quite
Giuseppe Englert, Aria, 1965
a performance.
108 : 109
Performances occur in a variety of places: in urban, public, semi-public or private
spaces, in formal or informal situations, in intimate or anonymous settings. Urban
spaces and building typologies frame activities and performances; on the other
hand their form and structure have evolved in response to performances.
London sustains a dynamic culture of emerging theatrical performances in a variety
of venues. Working in groups of three, you are asked to find a performance in
a small theatre and record your experience there. Your presentation should
describe performance and setting, the play and the space in which it is performed
and observed. The theatre is a place to see and be seen – the boxes, bar areas,
balconies and stairs in some theatres can be regarded as performance spaces
in themselves.
Output
Drawing on skills gained in the first semester, you are asked to find a way of
describing the theatrical action and theatrical devices employed by the director,
e.g. manipulations of perception, etc. You should also undertake a sketch survey
of the space. The survey should include a plan and section drawn to scale and
hard-line (using your drawing board) on A1 sheets of paper. For this, you will have
to take some measurements and make use of a plan obtained from the theatre.
You should present the following:
•Sectionandplanatscale1:50or1:100
•Recordingoftheperformance,e.g.anotationormap
•Youarealsoaskedtorecreateaphysicaldimensionofyourtheatreinthe
quadrangle at Knights Park at scale 1:1. This can be an aspect, or a part of the
theatre space - you could use string or masking tape, found objects, etc. You
may choose a vertical, horizontal, planar, or cubic dimension; work with the lawn,
facades, or space of the quad. The only requirement is that the dimension be
recreated at scale 1:1.
The following theatres are recommended, but there are many more places of
interest: Royal Court Theatre, Soho Theatre, Southwark, Playhouse Theatre
Company, The Cottesloe at the National Theatre, The Roundhouse, Hampstead
Theatre, Jerwood Space, The Pit at the Barbican Centre, Sadler’s Wells & Lilian
Baylis Theatres, Young Vic, Old Vic, Half, Moon Young People’s Theatre, Little
Angel Theatre, Almeida Theatre
In the following week, the quad will host an artist-in-residence, Aaron Williamson,
who will be staging a series of live performances.
8a Performance : Theatrical Space Installations
Input
Natalia Rzepka, Notation of a performance at the Half Moon Theatre, London
Sarah Henry, Audience and Performer Notation of the Rose Theatre Kingston
8a Performance : studentwork
110 : 111
Jennifer Bull
Mickaela Pellett
Elisabeth Bell, Sarah Henry, Hannah Shaw
8a Performance : studentwork
Felisha Ohane-Djan, Aboud Aboud, Lesleyanne
Bennet, Cagla Guvec, Omar Abduljawad, Shoreen
Lobban, Natasha Rajmohan, Emma Croyle
112 : 113
Jamie Mitchell ,Bradlee Smart, Casey Sole
Felisha Ohene-Djan, Aboud Aboud, Lesleyanne Bennett, Cagla Guvec,
Omar Abduljawad, Shoreen Lobban, Natasha Rajmohan, Emma Croyle
8a Performance : studentwork
Overview
114 : 115
8b Surface Geometry : Ben Lewis
116 : 117
Mickaela Pellett, Charlotte Calver
Studio 3
LesleyAnne Bennett, Caroline Lozynsky
8b Surface Geometry : studentwork
Prabjyot Mankoo
118 : 119
Matthew Hawley
James Foote
Jamie Mitchell, Casey Sole
8b Surface Geometry : studentwork
120 : 121
Suggested reading
Georges Perec, ‘Species of Spaces’,
Italo Calvino. ‘Invisible Cities’. London :
Vintage, 1997
(edited and translated by John Sturrock), Mark Z. Danielewski, ‘Mark Z.
London, Penguin Books, 1999
Archilab: exhibition catalogues since
1999
Coose van Bruggen, ‘Frank O.Gehry,
Guggenheim Museum of Bilbao’, New
York, H.N. Abrams, 1998
Jorge Luis Borges. Ficciones (Fictions).
New York, London, Toronto : Alfred A.
Diller and Scofidio, ‘Blur’, original sketch, 2002
Knopf / Everyman’s Library, 1993
Danielewski’s House of Leaves
(by Zampanò ; with introduction and
notes by Johnny Truant)’, London,
Doubleday, 2001
Kevin Lynch, ‘The Image of the City’,
Cambridge, [Mass.], London, MIT
Press, 1960
122 : 123
it ceases to be appropriated. Space is a doubt: I constantly have to create a mark on
it, to designate it, it is never my space, it is never a given, and I have to conquer it.
Georges Perec, Species of Spaces (Espèces d’Espaces).
I am a filmmaker and an author. I usually work with scripts, synopsis, and texts.
All these are related to concepts, intentions. Then I have to deal with shootings with
actors and technical problems. I have learned through the years that the peculiar move
from the initial concept to its materialization is highly problematic: whether you execute
(kill) what is written, or you adapt yourself to the form thus created. Something has
to move, something has to hybridize itself, something has to be deformed. Original
intentions are often proven too vague, possibly boring or even wrong.
I would like to explore with you in a playful way this problematic process from
intention to materialization in architectural design.
The aim of this one-day workshop is for you to understand the instrumentality of
language as a tool for production; to explore and challenge your understanding
and interpretation of space through words; to question what an architectural concept
is (made for/made of). It is an opportunity for you to consider your relationship with
your everyday environment and use the over-familiar as a basis for inspiration in
a design project.
Two Questions
01. what is space? How do you grasp space, how do you understand it, how
do you work with? How can you describe it? how do you know it? Is space
self-evident? Do we really know what surround us – the ordinary, the banal,
the mundane, the obvious?
02. what is design? The English word ‘design’ comes from the Latin word ‘designare’,
which means ‘to mark something with a distinctive sign’. French words ‘Dessein’
(intent, purpose) and ‘Dessin’ (drawing) share the same etymological origin. This
means that design is an enquiry approach, and not only a method of expression.
8c Wor(l)ds : Stéphane Querrec and Ersi Ioannidou
Space becomes a question, it ceases to be obvious, it ceases to be integrated,
03
06
02
01
Wor(l)ds : sketches, drawings, models are instruments of thinking
05
04
08
07
124 : 125
11
and Other Pieces’
02 : Jorge Luis Borges, ‘Ficciones’, New
York: Everyman’s Library, 1993
03 : Italo Calvino, ‘Invisible Cities’
04 : G.B. Lenardi, ‘Allegory of the Arts
of Architectural Representation’
(detail), 1690
12
09
Translating words into worlds
01 : Georges Perec, ‘Species of Spaces
05: Vignola. Villa Farnese, ‘Caprarola’,
1617
06 : Daniel Libeskind, ‘The Burrow
Laws (detail)’, Micromegas, 1979
07 : Pilgrimage Church, ‘Banz’, 1710
08: F. Kiesler, ‘La Cite dans L’Espace’,
Austrian Pavillion, Paris Exhibition
13
‘The Monument of the Third
International’, c.1919
11 / 12 : Zaha Hadid, ‘Vitra Fire Station.
Weil am Reim’, Germany, 1990-1993
13 / 14 : Diller + Scofidio, ‘The Blur
Building’, Lake Neuchatel,
Switzerland, 2002
8c Wor(l)ds : lecture
14
10
of Decorative Arts, 1925
09 / 10 : Vladimir Evgrafovich Tatlin,
Emma Croyle, Caroline Lozynskyj, Corvin Medhat
Studio 3
Caroline Ly, Cagla Guvec, Felisha OhaneDjan, Leyla Osman, Omar Abduljawad
8c Wor(l)ds : studentwork
126 : 127
Hadas Even-Tzur, Jennifer Bull,
Sangita Southgate, Harshak Patel
Thomas Larsson, Lloyd Preston-Allen,
Thomas Haworth, Lee Sawyer
Matthew Mure
Sarah Henry, Hannah Shaw
8c Wor(l)ds : studentwork
128 : 129
130 : 131
A boy meets a girl. They talk to each other and arrange to meet the next day.
Exercise 1
Characterise the girl and the boy by making some typical pictures of her and
him. Try to account for the background, the ambience she / he is arranged in.
What kind of girl / guy is he?
background, education, hobbies, etc.
Exercise 2
The boy and the girl are on their way to meet each other.
Decide on whom you would like to accompany on her / his way to the date. Film
him/ her on this way.
What kind of expectations has your protagonist, how is she / he acting on her / his way:
Is he/ she looking forward to the meeting and full of energy or is she / he doubtful
and half-hearted?
Try to put her / his thoughts (without words) into pictures and use her / his environment
as a mirror of emotions.
The video clip should have a maximum duration of 3 minutes and ends with the
meeting of the two protagonists.
Tips for the pre-production
Create a personality profile of your protagonist in this special situation:
Where does he come from, what is his intention for the meeting, what is his
emotional condition?
Think about how you would like to express his emotional condition: by his behaviour,
an event, the surroundings, a daydream, a cutback etc.
How do you want to visualize the emotional condition? What kind of possibilities
do you have to show this: e.g. camera work, point of view, focal distance / depth
of focus, light, film editing, sounddesign / music, setdesign, colordesign /contrasts
Have a close look at the surroundings, in which you arrange the set. How can you
realise your conception?
Create a moodboard in the form of a photo collage of own pictures or found footage
material, to visualize the aesthetic concept of the movie.
Make a storyboard with all shots you intend to make, having in mind that you might
not realise it 1:1. If necessary, adjust it.
Do you have an audio-concept? Limit the sound to the original sound track,
sounddesign and, if you want, homemade music arrangements.
8d Boy meets Girl : Jürgen Klozenbücher
As a first step, make a short resume of her / his previous life: age, family
‘Tower Block’, a film
by Nikia Chryssos and
the Filmakademie
Baden-Württemberg
132 : 133
The medium film works with suggestive means. This is, of
course, very strong in commercials, scenic films or animation
films; but also in alleged objective reportages or documentaries
the viewer is swayed and channeled by these means:
Camera operation and camera perspective, lighting, editing,
sound design and music, production design, color correction,
effects and the directing of the actors and protagonists add
essentially to convey a certain image, emotion or mood to the
audience. These moods or ambiance contribute decisively to
the emotional impression of the film.
is the sole determinant. More important is a film’s ability
to create emotions that move us.
Lighting and staging of space (both interior and exterior)
definitely are important instruments – film space locates the
story, visualizes it and becomes its mirror image in the image
of an interior action. So the staging of film space can afford
us an inside look at the psyche of the protagonist.
8d Boy meets Girl : lecture
The rational understanding of a film is one thing, but never
Ahmad Jagot, Thomas Haworth, Lee Sawyer,
Lloyd Preston-Allen, Thomas Larsson
Matthew Mure, Duna Irschaid
134
8d Boy meets Girl : studentwork
134 : 135
quad
02 quadraphonic sound, or an electronic
adjective
system for reproducing it: The recording
01 designating or comprising four persons
sounded best in quad.
or things: rates for quad occupancy; a
03 quadriplegic: a special ward for quads.
quad-level house.
04 A quadriceps muscle. Often used in the
noun
plural.
01 Also called quadrat. a piece of type
verb (used with object)
metal of less height than the lettered types,
01 to space out (matter) by means of quads.
serving to cause a blank in printed matter,
(dictionary.com)
A performance in the Quad at Kingston University
used for spacing.
136 : 137
The faculty of Art, Design, and Architecture at Kingston University intends
to explore and test uses of the quadrangle at Knights Park as a performance
space. Events, performances and guests have been proposed by various
members of the faculty. Suggestions range from hosting an artist-in-residence
for a week to a performance by the artist-farmer Henry Cumbernauld involving
The quad is not a ‘blank canvas’; it already has been the site of various student
activities, e.g. the ‘human machine’ during one of our workshops last semester and
many others – in springtime the quad will host a family of ducks, lovingly fed and
cared for by our caretakers.
All of these proposed and current activities ‘produce space’ in various ways,
employing ’tools’ associated with various disciplines, using the human body,
animals, vegetation and materials, the human voice, light and shadow and so on.
If such a wide range of disciplines are interested in and capable of producing
space, what then is the role of architecture and what contribution can we make
as a school of architecture?
Events and performances in the quad could challenge us to rethink our position
as collaborators in ‘producing space’.
The faculty will host a collaborative competition among first year students to
investigate the architectural potential of the quad. One or several prizes will
be awarded for the best proposals. The prize will consist of the construction of
the proposal(s) – a budget of £ 10.000 will be made available by the faculty.
We will not have a comprehensive overview over the performances planned for
the quad, and we (hopefully) will be taken by surprise by some events. You will
therefore have to be pro-active rather than re-active. In generating ideas and
broadening your frame of reference, you are encouraged to engage as much as
possible with other disciplines, staff and students in the faculty and your tutors
will support you in this.
In thinking about and developing ideas for a ‘performance space’, you are
encouraged to draw on experiences gained and skills acquired through your
projects and workshops in the first semester. Specifically, you are encouraged
to use the field trip and the field trip assignments to be inspired by and
investigate the many ‘performance spaces’ of the contemporary city. The quad
project will be followed and continued by a second phase located at an urban
site in London.
The competition will be supported by a series of workshops on Thursdays.
8e Quad Competition : Performance Space
live pigs.
Ahmad Jagot
Ahmad Jagot
8e Quad competition : studentwork
138 : 139
Chris Brooker
Charlotte Calver
David Wareham
8e Quad competition : studentwork
140 : 141
Lloyd Preston-Allen, Tom Larson, Lee Sawyer
Jennifer Bull, Hadas Even-Tzur, Sangita Southgate
8e Quad competition : studentwork
142 : 143
Elisabeth Bell, Sarah Henry, Hannah Shaw
Elisabeth Bell, Sarah Henry, Hannah Shaw
8e Quad competition : studentwork
144 : 145
Matthew Hawley
Matthew Hine, Rob Whitten, Dan Wilkinson, Jack Mousley
8e Quad competition : studentwork
146 : 147
Natalia Rzepka Isha Amra Naim
Mickaela Pellett
Peter Bayley
Natasha Rajmohan, Lesleyanne Bennet, Emma Croyle
8e Quad competition : studentwork
148 : 149
Laura Berge, Robyn Jones
Laura Berge, Robyn Jones
8e Quad competition : studentwork : Competition Winner
150 : 151
theater or theatre noun
04.01 The quality or effectiveness of a
01 A building, room, or outdoor structure
theatrical production: good theater; awful
for the presentation of plays, films, or other
theater.
dramatic performances.
04.02 Dramatic material or the use of such
02 A room with tiers of seats used for lectures material: ‘His summation was a great piece
or demonstrations: an operating theater at
of courtroom theater’ (Ron Rosenbaum).
a medical school.
05 The audience assembled for a dramatic
03.01 Dramatic literature or its performance;
performance.
drama: the theater of Shakespeare and
06 A place that is the setting for dramatic
Marlowe.
events.
03.02 The milieu of actors and playwrights. 07 A large geographic area in which
03.03 The quality or effectiveness of a
military operations are coordinated: the
theatrical production: good theater; awful
European theater during World War II.
theater.
(dictionary.com)
03.04 Dramatic material or the use of such
material: ‘His summation was a great piece
of courtroom theater’ (Ron Rosenbaum).
152 : 153
For your final project you will be asked to look at aspects of ‘performance’ in an urban
context and propose a fringe theatre for a site in East London.
Site Investigation
On Tuesday, March 11, we will meet up at Knights Park and then travel to East
London to visit an area located between Shoreditch and Brick Lane.
You should look at the built fabric of this area and carefully observe the way people
interact with their built environment and with each other.
You should then select one of the sites suggested in the enclosed map and focus
on an aspect of urban life that you find particularly intriguing.
•Drift,observe,gatherdata,identifyphenomena,etc
•Develop a strategy for systematic observation and recording, e.g. working
with time (of day), position (of observer), research (through media, through
interviews on site)
George Perec has the following recommendation, set out in his chapter
‘The Street’: ‘You must set about it more slowly, almost stupidly. Force yourself
to write down what is of no interest, what is most obvious, most colourless.’
Through mapping, your intention should be to look, record and begin to
understand the ways in which specific human territories are defined. We want
you to take an involved attitude to the investigations. For example, you could
look at and record:
•movement:pedestrianandvehicular,publicandprivatetransportation
•program:commercial,residential,entertainment,not-for-proit,etc.
•privateandpublicdomain
•landmarks: navigation and analogue visual relationships, digital surveillance, CCTV
•surface:texture,temperature,scale,porosity,colour
•sound,noiseandsmell
•infrastructure:transport,utilities,digitalcommunicationnetworks
•transactions:buying,selling,exchanging,communication,information
•densityofoccupation,ofincidentsanddegreeofgentriication
Design Brief
Your research and survey of theatres has yielded a broad range of theatrical
strategies and building types.
Some theatres make use of sophisticated machinery and spatial devices to
produce illusions, other performances may take place in a minimal space shared
by actors and audience; an entry sequence may connect a series of intricate
reception and hospitality spaces, other theatres may incorporate the use of
public space or courtyards and backyards as part of such a promenade.
You are asked to draw on your own and your colleagues’ research to identify
a schedule of accommodation that you will require for your theatrical concept.
9 Fringe Theatre
•lightandshadow:sunlight,daylight,artiiciallight
Matthew Mure
Ludan Lai
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Configurations
154 : 155
Alex Larelli
Alex Larelli
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Geometry
156 : 157
Caroline Lozynskyi
Jennifer Bull
Emma Croyle
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Geometry
158 : 159
Hadas Even-Tzur
Emily Hilliar
Jamie Mitchell
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Light
160 : 161
Lee Sawyer
Charlotte Calver
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Mass
162 : 163
Huseyin Cicek
Cara Beveridge
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Mass / Program
Amisha Vekaria
164 : 165
Marina Polycarpou
Robyn Jones
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Sound & Noise
166 : 167
Matt Herbert
Marcos Konaros
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Surface
168 : 169
Casey Sole
Michael Ha
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Trajectories
170 : 171
Thomas Haworth
Hannah Shaw
Laura Berge
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Views
172 : 173
Duna Irshaid
Sangita Southgate
9 Fringe Theatre : studentwork : Views
174: 175
First published in 2008
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Kingston University
All rights reserved.
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in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
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permission in writing from the publisher.
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A catalogue record of this book is available from
the British Library
ISBN 978-0-9554744-7-7
Co-ordination and editorial supervision by Christoph Lueder
Designed by www.marit.co.uk
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Joanna Bailey – Joanna is interested in
Uwe Schmidt–Hess – Uwe’s field of interest is
understanding architecture through learning
the creation of spaces which embody intuition,
and teaching and in issues of diversity.
experience, and sensation, exploring
Laura de Beden – Formula 1 for making your
architectures beyond objects and surfaces.
design richer and more meaningful: expand
Markus Seifermann – Markus is interested in
your cultural boundaries and be curious about
narrative architecture and his work is focused
life. Laura enjoys literature and poetry,
on the relationship between text, story and
Verlaine’s Chanson d’Automne, Giacomo
space. One of his current projects ‘The lost
Leopardi, Japanese haikus; the opera and jazz,
space of Stiller’ explores the architecture of
Puccini and Miles Davis; her favourite painter,
a lost identity.
Paul Klee; architects, Palladio and Aldo Rossi.
Ben Sweeting – Ben is interested in the border
Angela Ford – Architectural modelmaking
between architecture and everyday life and
is the physical creation of sequential poetic
the corresponding relation between design
volumes.
and ethics; he is currently a PhD by design
Ersi Ioannidou – Ersi’s research is an
student at the Bartlett, UCL
exploration into the modern meaning of
Charlie Voss – Charlie is particularly interested
the minimum dwelling. It particularly
in the micro–processes of evolving landscapes
focuses on the minimum means that help
and their social and cultural impacts.
the individual create a sense of at home
Jinbok Wee – Jinbok’s main interest is
in transit – what she calls the minimum home.
in ‘matter organisation’ – organisational
Zoe Jones – Zoe is interested in teaching
manipulations of material / immaterial
and learning new ways to represent ideas,
realities.
responses and experiences. Alongside
Jürgen Klozenbücher – Architecture should
teaching and practicing she is currently
not speak to us about technique or materiality
converting her own house.
but capture our imagination with its story just
Florence Kong – Florence graduated from
as a good book or a good film does.
the AA in 2005, worked with Rocco Yim on
Ben Lewis – Through his research he has
projects in Hong Kong and mainland China,
developed a keen interest in geometrical
worked with Zaha Hadid Architects on
forms, and the form making process often
projects in Glasgow and China, is currently
referred to as ‘form–finding’, through his work
working for KPF on projects in Moscow and
he has collaborated with some of the worlds
London. Interested in light and reflection,
leading architectural practices to realise
urban morphology and land intensification,
these complex forms in materials as diverse
personal work was shortlisted for the 11th
as glass–fibre fabric and glulaminated timber.
Venice Biennale International Architecture
Kwong Loke – Theatre is humanism inhabiting
Exhibition.
the empty space. The challenge space throws
Christoph Lueder – Christoph is interested
at us is to find the humanity and imagination to
in the diagram as a discursive and generative
defy its gravity.
tool in architecture and urbanism. He is Acting
Stéphane Querrec – What is the role of the
Course Director BA Architecture at Kingston
Subject in today’s society? What’s the trouble
University and First Year Leader.
with the Subject?
Harry Paticas – Harry has recently set up his
own practice, PATICAS ARCHITECTURE, and
will be exhibiting a prototype fabric and earth
toilet for the London Festival of Architecture in
June 2008.
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