8 posts tagged “review”
Last Friday, following an Invitation by Wolf D. Prix (Coop Himmelb(l)au) and Reiner Zettl, I joined into the Panel of Critics for the Diploma Presentation of the Density group. The Postgraduate Students of the Angewandte had to present their final Thesis to receive the Master of Science degree. The Panel included Wolf D. Prix, Jeffrey Kippnis, Rainer Pirker, Robert Neumeyer and Brennan Buck (Assistant, Greg Lynn Studio) . The postgraduate course is called Urban Srategies, and that is basically what the students presented.
It´s done. Last weekend we attended the final review of the Follymorph course Sandra and I teached at the DIA, Bauhaus Dessau. The scope of the workshop was to explore possibilities for architectural design emerging from a combination of selforganizational behaviour and computational design. The students had to explore an initial gypsum
I was not sure wether I should like it or hate it, the IBM building of the Otis College of art. I remember I saw the oldschool computer punchcard fassade of the building allready in one of our modernism books. When you start to Europe from the LAX Airport you can clearly see it, as it is in its close proximity. Well, Sandra and I where anyway not there to admire the building, but to join the boards of critics at the final review of the landscape design studio. Takao Tajima, was so kind to invite us to join in. The issue of the course was to design a bridge over the LA river, that should incorporate further program and include the landscape issue of its surroundings. The projects encompassed the issue in various ways, and some of the projects that best sticked to my mind where those trying to blend the heterogenous environment into one connecting entity, thus resulting in spectacular possibilities for the transition between the shores of the river.
What I really like about the final reviews at USC is that the students work is collected around a week before the final review. Which means that this boys and girls can show up fresh, and with enough sleep before their presentation. Oh Boy, have seen a couple of presentations with half dead bodies, uttering gibberish sentences that barely made sence. Not here, nope, no sir: This students were like fresh out of the box, and you noticed that in their presentation, clear language, well presented...yes, thats a plus.
Talking about the project, Sandra and I saw two groups today: One group designing kind of a community beach house, the other designing a public library situated in a park in West Hollywood. I think I mentioned allready the library project, so I will not go into any further detail on that issue. What fascinated me more was the beach house. Situated on one of the most lavish settings you can imagine for a beach house at Santa Monica, I had rather a hard time trying to understand how such a thankful site sparked so little spatial imagination in the students mind. Of course you can solve such an architectonic problem with an ultra rational plan...and maybe by today standards in contemporary architecture this can be considered a radical step, but only if you do that completely conciously, which I doubt in this case. On the other hand, if the argument is that it is the last remaining site on the beach at Santa Monica, why clutter this space with parking structures and an architecture as exiting as a flask of valium? Does boring architecture increase your properties value? This is not meant to be
an evaluation of form, but an evaluation of space, so i´m not up to saying that something curvilinear is better than a box, its only about how you use one concept or the other.
Axel Schmitzberger, assistent professor for architecture at the California Polytechnic University is running a very ambitious studio where his students scrutinize design strategies with the use of innovative softwares such as Generative Components and enviromental simulation softwares such as ECOTEC,. Some of his students are computer debutants, and keeping this in mind you can state that this studio has pushed them far forward in terms of architecture design techniques. Thursday afternoon Sandra and I joined into the panel of critics for this semesters final review, the students task was to use the learned tools, in order to design a condominium on a site in Palm Springs. The enviromental simulation softwares came in handy, in order to explore the various climatic conditions on the site, so that they could be used as formgenerating parameters for the project. The various approaches reached from the use of wind-directions to create patterns of volume on the specific site, the use of hexagonal cells in various scales that formed into cooling channels criss crossing the site, to more rigid approaches like the use of the checkerboard formed land-division system. Actually this approach generated some interesting results, as it could be seen as a pixelated spatial condition. Among the critics were also Michael Fox and Juintow Lin, the heads of Foxlin who designed the installation Bubbles, which is on show right now at Materials & Applications in Silverlake. Something really nice about this review was the really cozy environment created by two huge, soft sofas. In conclusion: congratulations to Axel Schmitzberger for his effort and the impressive progress his students made within his studio.
Today I had to hop in for Christoph Kapeller at the USC to replace him as a Table crit in his Studio. The students task, I think I mentioned allready before in the log, is to design a library within the boundaries of a park. There are only four days to go for the students to finish their projects, and within this buzz I had to go from project to project to advise the students in final touches for their plans and models. I was surprised to see that the USC students have also picked up Lasercutting for their models, though its not done in house, and the students have to pay massive ammounts of money to get floorplates lasercutted for them, at a company that is specialised in large format printing.
Sandra Manninger and Matias del Campo joined the board of critics at the midterm review of a SCI-Arc studio whose teaching board include Elena Manferdini, Florencia Pita and Ramiro Diaz Granado. Following a ground course in architecture design techniques the students task is to approach a specific architecture design. In this case concieving a car showroom for exotic, collectible automobiles. The students were encouraged to find inspiration for their design approach trough the investigation and exploration of the design of exotic cars. The lines and curves of the automobiles where used then as starting point for the design of cellular structures that embodied the main programmatic point, the car showroom. Exept of the car analysis the students had to incorporate issues such as Morphology, Porosity, Structure and the issue of Chromatic into their design scheme. The board of critics included Michael Speaks, Jason Payne, Hernan Diaz Alonso, Marcelo Spina and Tom Wiscombe. Troughout the course of the review certain repeating critiques emerged, encompassing issues such as the use of the terminology and its impact on the students designs, and even more the issue of programmatics vs design techniques. It is a question if, for example, the term Porosity can be applied upon the bodywork of a car, as this is probably more about apertures. Very rigid and controlled apertures. At the end of the review the issue of programmatics dominated an impromptu discussion within the board of critics, as wether how much of programmatics can, and should be applied upon the Students work. Whatsoever, it is totally valid and fair, that students learn design techniques, without applying the weight of program on top of it. This may be a second step within the design course, as a result of the interpretation of the exotic morphologies unfolding out of various design techniques.
After our visit two weeks ago, Peter Testa invited us to join the board of critics anew for the last review before the finals at SCI-Arc. The main investigation in this terms task is about the application of the template as a design tool as well as to investigate the potentials of braiding as a tool for the creation of architectonic entities. The strategies applied by students encompassed issues such as stranding, bifurcating fibers, twining material into shape and exploring qualities such as viscocity, foam and liquid behaviour. The students were encouraged to find machinic processes for the fabrication of their concepts in a first step. After the initial phase of finding strategies of fabrications based on the concept of braiding, the students had to apply the approach to a specific design. The designs reached from Fassade systems applied to an existing building, to Towerlike structures to spatial aggregations.
