Modified 03 February 2022 by Peter Yi

2022-02-03 - Positioning Images

How do you use an image to convey your thesis position?

An image carries multiple layers of intent, from the selection of the image, to its framing and cropping, to edits on the content of the image itself. Think about how each of these layers of intent correlate to ideas in your thesis.

Questions you may answer through the image:

Where your design proposal/intervention is sited.

In what manner you are inviting an audience to see/understand your thesis.

Your position in relation to design methodology (layering, imprinting, molding, stacking, etc.) This could come from an inherent design interest you’ve been exploring in previous projects.

Dan Graham

James Leng

1 - Crop

Carefully crop one (or a series of images) with design intent

Philipp Schaerer

2-Insert

Position the content(s) of one image within another.

Ryan Panos

3-Fill in the Blank

Pick your own (and explain the technique as it pertains to a design interest or a design method of approach to your thesis)

Sze Tsung Leong, Lauren Marsolier

Philipp Schaerer

2022-01-13 - “Architecture is Always in the Middle”

Type in key ideas (visible)

Add image references (visible)

Comment on images/text for working ideas/conversations (hidden)

Each group - summarize your findings as a group, and for individual theses + type in one question for the class.

G1: What did everyone make of the part about the Plane of Consistency and Plane of Organisation? (p.96)

Interesting to read Agarez and Mora’s “The ‘Bread & Butter’ of Architecture: Investigating Everyday Practices” in relation to the push for unionization at SHoP with Architectural Workers United (AWU)... overall thoughts on the push for the collective rather than individualism in the industry?

G2: Viewing architects as producers and architecture as “effective” in real life further developing the notion of “opportunity to demonstrate architecture as a public service”. Fostering a positive possibility for new levels of architectural engagement free of autonomy, autopoiesis, and control.

Q: What should we ask of an ontology of everyday architecture?

Q2: What is the “bread and butter” of our theses?

Thesis impact on G2:

David: What is the machine/assemblage of a stadium? Thinking of a stadium as a city or a city as a stadium, not just the physical or mechanical but the ecology and interrelated systems.

John: How does investment in/of design (the architect behind design decision) plays a role in the end product (specifically healing spaces)? What is the individual's role in the final design? How does salaried work vs starchitect work differ?

Alexa: What a body can do (physically and materially) in relation to space and control? Can elements of sameness and substance develop a “habit of the split” in the realms of public and shared spaces?

G3: Aracely’s relevance: the horizontal versus vertical hierarchy of community engagement; CDC Detroit^[a] for example - using

Ivan illich - “the deschooling society” idea that community members should have access to education and peer learning from architects, and post WWII urban renewal, how to engage the community and an establishment of community research centers

Jie’s thesis: What does a project mean to an architect, and what does the architect mean to the project. self organized activities and construction; and the role of the architect in the project -(Alex:) architect as an educational resource (give a man a fish, teach a man to fish).

Why did Peter put us three together and what can we learn from this “intellectual taxonomy”

Alex: Everybody has design sensibilities. Who becomes an architect and why?

Where do communities learn architectural concepts from the architect, versus where the architect is taught by the community.

Question: Reading comprehension question: what was the bridge to the bread and butter? And what was Peter’s justification of putting the three of us together?

How could architects have successfully dissolved the idea of the genius architect without needing to break into commercial, corporate ventures.

G4:

Clayton’s relevance: there exists a disconnect between team players (lead Architect and ‘salaried’ architects, architect and laborers, etc.)

Clayton’s Q: What is/will be the effect of industrialization on the role of the ‘salaried’ architect? What does this mean for the future of development and the design process?

Jacob: The movement away from the big name Architect to individuals working in a collective design-decision process begs the question, “Of what importance is my creativity? How much is it worth?”

Rosa’s: Questioning role of academia in supporting the fact that there is competence in teamwork, salaried work, etc and yet presenting “starchitect” figures as canon in lieu of Gensler-SOM-Perkins type architecture. Mentioned Zaha Hadid Architects becoming employee-owned → salaried architect not just contributes to starchitecture but is now owner. Shared graphic novel “Undocument: the architecture of migrant detention” as potential example of “haecceities”. Intrigued by the notion of “haecceities” as they relate to how folklore spatializes.

Q: How can we justify individual thesis work in academia that is then “superjuried” given the “salaried” architect vs. starchitect discourse?

Add your response text(s)/projects/precedents ABOVE (image + link). Save reading files to this folder with this naming convention: author-name-reading-name.pdf.

Choose a color and give your reading image a 2pt border with that color. Change your name to that same color below:

Alexa, Alex, Aracely, Clayton, David, Elizabeth, Jacob, Jie, John, Peter, Rosa, Tessa, Zoe

For the start of class Thursday 1/13, complete the following readings:

Agarez, Ricardo, and Nelson Mora. 2015. “The ‘Bread & Butter’ of Architecture: Investigating Everyday Practices.” Footprint: Delft Architecture Theory Journal Volume 9, no. 2 (Autumn/Winter): 1-7.

Gough, Tim. 2015. “Architecture is Always in the Middle.” Footprint: Delft Architecture Theory Journal Volume 9, no. 2 (Autumn/Winter): 89-98.

[a]@landero@umich.edu Check out community engagement within DCDC's works:

https://www.dcdc-udm.org/design

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