IAAC Lecture Series 2015/16

Thursday 8th of October 2015
Jaime Lerner
Jaime Lerner Arquitectos Associados
 
@ 19.30, IAAC Auditorium
Open to the Public

JAIME LERNER is an architect and urban planner, founder of the Instituto Jaime Lerner and chairman of Jaime Lerner Arquitetos Associados (JLAA). Former president of the UIA – International Union of Architects in the 2002/2005 term, three-time mayor of Curitiba, Brazil, he led the urban revolution that made the city renowned for urban planning, public transportation, environmental social programs and urban projects. He served as governor of Parana State twice and conducted an economic and social transformation both in the urban and rural areas. His international awards include the highest United Nations Environmental Award (1990), Child and Peace Award from UNICEF (1996), the 2001 World Technology Award for Transportation, and the 2002 Sir Robert Mathew Prize for the Improvement of Quality of Human Settlements. In 2010 Lerner was nominated among the 25 most influential thinkers in the world by the Time magazine and in 2011, in recognition for his leadership, vision and contribution in the field or sustainable urban mobility, he received the Leadership in Transport Award, granted by the International Transport Forum at the OECD. JLAA practice develops projects for the public and private sectors for cities in Brazil and abroad, such as Porto Alegre, São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasília, Florianópolis, Recife, Luanda (Angola), David (Panama), Durango, Oaxaca, Mazatlán (Mexico) and Santiago de Los Caballeros (Dominican Republic).

Opening the lecture Silvia Brandi, IAAC Academic Coordinator, gave some words of welcome to all then inviting the UPC Vice-Rector of Architecture Josep Parcerisa to do the same. Silvia then invited Areti Markopoulou, Academic Director of IAAC, whom officially kicked of the Opening Ceremony, welcoming the 250 people present in the audience, among which the 130 new students from over 45 different countries, representatives of the local architecture community, both professional and academic, and the IAAC faculty and staff. She then gave some words of welcome to our guest Greg Lynn, whom returned to IAAC after 10 years, appreciating the rapid evolution of the Institute.

Greg then took the word, giving us a panoramic of advanced architecture, from his point of view, showing us projects that ranged from cutlery, to chairs, to boats, to apartments, and more, all developed through a wide variety of techniques.

GREG LYNN was an innovator in redefining the medium of design with digital technology as well as pioneering the fabrication and manufacture of complex functional and ergonomic forms using CNC (Computer Numerically Controlled) machinery. The buildings, projects, publications, teachings and writings associated with his office have been influential in the acceptance and use of advanced materials and technologies for design and fabrication. As design opportunities today extend across multiple scales and media, his studio Greg Lynn FORM continues to define the cutting edge of design in a variety of fields. His work is in the permanent collections of the most important design and architecture museums in the world including the CCA, SFMoMA, ICA Chicago and MoMA. Because of his early studies in philosophy and architecture he has been involved in combining the realities of design and construction with the speculative, theoretical and experimental potentials of writing and teaching. This unique and innovative approach to design has also established him as an influential figure across many disciplines and led to consultations and collaborations with companies like BMW, Swarovski, Alessi, Vitra, Disney and Imaginary Forces. In 2002, he left his position as the Professor of Spatial Conception and Exploration at the ETHZ (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich) and became an Ordentlicher University Professor at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. He is a Studio Professor at UCLA’s school of Architecture and Urban Design where he is currently spearheading the development of an experimental research robotics lab. Since the turn of the century he has been the Davenport Visiting Professor at Yale University.

Greg Lynn was born in 1964 in Ohio. He graduated from Miami University of Ohio with degrees in both architecture (Bachelor of Environmental Design) and philosophy (Bachelor of Philosophy) and later from Princeton University where he received a graduate degree in architecture (Master of Architecture). He received an Honorary Doctorate degree from the Academy of Fine Arts & Design in Bratislava. He received the American Academy of Arts & Letters Architecture Award in 2003. In 2001, Time Magazine named Greg Lynn one of 100 of the most innovative people in the world for the 21st century. In 2005, Forbes Magazine named him one of the ten most influential living architects. In 2008, he won the Golden Lion at the 11th International Venice Biennale of Architecture. In 2010, he was awarded a fellowship from United States Artists.

IAAC Lecture Series 2015/16

Monday 5th of October 2015
OPENING LECTURE
Greg Lynn
Greg Lynn Form
 
@ 18.30, IAAC Auditorium
Open to the Public

18.30 // Opening
18.45 // Welcome – Areti Markopoulou, IAAC Academic Director
19.00 // Lecture – Greg Lynn
20.00 // Refreshments

GREG LYNN was an innovator in redefining the medium of design with digital technology as well as pioneering the fabrication and manufacture of complex functional and ergonomic forms using CNC (Computer Numerically Controlled) machinery. The buildings, projects, publications, teachings and writings associated with his office have been influential in the acceptance and use of advanced materials and technologies for design and fabrication. As design opportunities today extend across multiple scales and media, his studio Greg Lynn FORM continues to define the cutting edge of design in a variety of fields. His work is in the permanent collections of the most important design and architecture museums in the world including the CCA, SFMoMA, ICA Chicago and MoMA. Because of his early studies in philosophy and architecture he has been involved in combining the realities of design and construction with the speculative, theoretical and experimental potentials of writing and teaching. This unique and innovative approach to design has also established him as an influential figure across many disciplines and led to consultations and collaborations with companies like BMW, Swarovski, Alessi, Vitra, Disney and Imaginary Forces. In 2002, he left his position as the Professor of Spatial Conception and Exploration at the ETHZ (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich) and became an Ordentlicher University Professor at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. He is a Studio Professor at UCLA’s school of Architecture and Urban Design where he is currently spearheading the development of an experimental research robotics lab. Since the turn of the century he has been the Davenport Visiting Professor at Yale University.

Greg Lynn was born in 1964 in Ohio. He graduated from Miami University of Ohio with degrees in both architecture (Bachelor of Environmental Design) and philosophy (Bachelor of Philosophy) and later from Princeton University where he received a graduate degree in architecture (Master of Architecture). He received an Honorary Doctorate degree from the Academy of Fine Arts & Design in Bratislava. He received the American Academy of Arts & Letters Architecture Award in 2003. In 2001, Time Magazine named Greg Lynn one of 100 of the most innovative people in the world for the 21st century. In 2005, Forbes Magazine named him one of the ten most influential living architects. In 2008, he won the Golden Lion at the 11th International Venice Biennale of Architecture. In 2010, he was awarded a fellowship from United States Artists.

CRADE ET VIVANT

Dirty and Alive

The 7 projects presented, working in the the area of connection between the Port and Montjuïc, proposed the future of Barcelona as follows:

Surface on Demand – Ran Shabtay - a language, or a system that can be adapt anywhere any time, as long as the city has water sources and physical buildings. This system can be changed and adapted to any situation.

RHIZOME_Adaptable Network – Marina Lazareva, Igor Cegar, Tamara Ivanovic, and Teresa Lodoño - imagines a different city, a different era where a model of transporting people from city to city, in a way of adventures and experiences, is proposed.

HEDONIST MOD –  Adhitya Rathinam, John Koshy, and Zachary Trattner - project addressed the questions of what the architecture of a hedonist society could offer, and how could it be quantified, extending Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill’s concept ofhedonistic calculus with the parameters of sun vs. shade, space vs. proximity and exclusivity vs. inclusivity.

Triphibian_Social Constructionism - Ksenia Dyusemabeva, Asya Güney, Edgar Navarrete Sanchez, and Diego Ramirez Leon – where the term of triphibian is understood as a concept that embraces the three different dimensions that surround us: air, water and ground. This concept is not referred as a mere geometrical or physical representation, but as an operative posture that is encompassing and blending with the three-dimensionality of the environment.

BARCELO-D-ISM - Ayaan Barodawala, Rossana Graca, and Saad Saheen - project that attempts to seek ways of relating the Barcelona Port and the arrival (or departure) of goods. The consumption-focused lifestyle of an urban population adds fuel to the notion of distribution further. This is an area of immediate opportunity.

Responsive Habitats – Jinyang Han, Michelle Tseng, Prawit Kittichanthira, and Taiesha Edwards - a nexus of annual local and tourist social exchanges, leading to the spread of plant-life, wildlife and aquatic life. Real-time human behavior triggers the exploit of green-energy amidst Montjuic and the seaport, which then feeds the transition of Responsive Habitats.

Landscape of Experience - Joy Harb, Pia Grobner, and Yanna Haddad -  an attempt to draw the outline of the future shape of Barcelona. Through sensors and processors the structure will have intelligence, allowing it to respond to the conditions and react to the necessities. Kinetic structures allow the movement and changes.

The 8 project proposals tackle questions regarding Material Intelligence. Smart materials such as shape-memory materials, piezoelectric, thermoelectric or bio-materials able to adjust their properties to different environmental conditions, allow to programme buildings at a nanoscale, and open up a series of applications on an architectural scale and industrial applications. Furthermore, new composite materials that present preset combinations of mechanical properties or multi-functional properties of non-homogeneous materials in shape and composition across a wide range of scales bring forth the exploration of a shift in design culture, taking us to a new level of material awareness. Material Intelligence in combination with Artificial and Computational Intelligence, simulations, sensors, actuators, as well as with bio-mimetic innovations provide revolutionary ideas on growth, adaptability, repair, sensitivity, replication and energy savings in architecture.

Self-Adaptive Membrane – Shreyas More, and Nohelia Gonzalez – proposes a totally passive and kinetic system that allows the expansion on a geometry that automatically responds to the natural increase of heat of the environment.

Colourmorph - Devika Chandrababu, Fathimah Sujna Shakir, and Ninada Kashyap - developing a pixel that changes colour in response to environmental changes and exercises control over this colour change through remote interfaces.

PneuHertz - Mansi Jasmin Radadia, Ryal Sequiera, and Silasalin Krisanarungkhun - an air supported structure that inhales to assume a predetermined form and acoustic quality to match its user requirement. It exhales to leave a folded footprint of fabric.

Hydromembrane – Luisa Roth - a humidity sensitive composite system which can be introduced to different potential applications, at a macro- or a micro-scale, reacting to moisture as the input and responding with aperture deformations as a primer output, as well as water absorption and evaporation.

FABRIcFLATION - Dafni Arnellou, Nina Papakonstantinou, and Yota Sarantinoudi – investigates textile tension and its ability to transform into self-supporting and self-adapting surfaces, when a system of patterns from different materials is embedded on it.

InSand – Anusha Arunkumar, Kunaljit Chadha, and Yessica Gabriela Mendez Sierra - focused on nano scale understanding of material behaviour to shape-control-design landforms, through deposition of a binder into an abundant natural material, letting nature’s forces to take over to present and fade away landforms.

Soft Skin - Farah Alayeli, Lubna Alayeli, Nina Jotanovic, and Ceren Temel -  investigates possibilities of using airinflation in architecture, as an active response to constantly changing parameters in environment responding to real time data of wind and light.

Remembrane - Josep Alcover, Ji Won Jun, and Matteo Silverio - allows us to envision a shift in the future of architectural approach in which spaces, buildings and entire cities will be able to move and adapt autonomously to perform in the most optimal way.

The many project proposals consisted in:

MethLAB - Giuseppe di Domenico, Nada Shalaby, Philip Serif, Yasmine Hamza – Proposes to use food waste for Anaerobic digestion, the process of degradation of a substance in the absence of oxygen in 4 major steps:Hydrolysis : the cleavage of chemical bonds by adding water; Acidogenesis: products of the hydrolysis to fatty acids; Acetogenesis: bacteria consumes precursors and produce acetate; Methanogenisis: break down of acetic acid to produce methane gas; finally proposing the Methanecus Wormacus.

Aeon - Maria Alexandra Poliakov, Raissa Pertierra, Wilton Neves - a system that promotes sustainability since it targets environmental, social and economic factors. Environmentally, through the increase in plant and animal biodiversity, natural resource use, and pollution prevention . Socially, through the promotion of a healthier lifestyle, education and community interaction. Economically, through cost savings and research/development.

Mycology – Silvia Oliva Marco - proposes a metabolic cycle that integrates multiscalar processes creating a interaction between people and nature, an evolutionary design strategy has been used to incorporate material cycles with architectural program cycles through time based adapt-ability, grow-ability and decompose-ability.

The System – Ekaterina Levkina – a system proposal for water filtration taking advantage of algae properties.

BioHydro UpCycler – Samuel Shapiro - This biophysical water purification machine relies on simple technologies to upcycle greywater for reuse. Compact and adaptable, it is designed to be integrated into a domestic setting, unlike most water purification systems, which operate at larger industrial scales.

Agro-Connectivity - Francesco Maria Massetti – proposes a public mobility system through micro-algae.

Meta-Genesis – Felipe Agudelo, Neel Kaul, Shashank Shahabadi – proposes to use biomimetics to create a breathing skin system allowing to control indoor temperatures.

Finally we visited the Design with Nature Kitchen, a collective project where all the proposals were actuated.

In response to the IaaC Alumni | Call for Speakers, IaaC invited 3 Alumni of excellence from around the world to come and share their specific experiences: Hemant Purohit (India, 2008) - session 1 – explained about his architectural and professional practice and the use of traditional technology with advanced design; Monika Wittig (USA, 2007) - session 2 – focused her presentation on research, development and her experience in this field; and Liliana Viveros (Mexico, 2011) - session 4 – discussed competitions and construction, giving an inside look to her own experience at FREE as a project leader.

The Symposium was opened by the founders of IaaC, Manuel Gausa, Vicente Guallart and Willy Müller, and the Directors of IaaC Lucas Capelli, Tomas Diez and Areti Markopoulou.

Here are the 6 projects presented:

Ressurecture - Maja Czesnik, Alessia Tosetto and Shruti Ramachandran – proposes a machine that recycles the daily waste of a region and checks the surrounding landfills and water bodies to produce fewer but more efficient products that are sent back to the market, finally recycling, producing energy, and generating knowledge through research and awareness.

GAIA - Salvador Martinez – proposes to hack the Super Organism, the planet, through the atmosphere and quantum entanglement to revert the effects of the planet’s temperature rising from entangled particles sent to the atmosphere, controlling and restoring the depletion of atmospheric layers; and suggesting a step closer to co-evolution of human being and environment.

[Inter]Bio-Cybernetics - Mehmet Yilmaz Akdogan – proposes a system for controlling real lava flow through the introduction of lava drilling pipes, creating a controlled environment where the observation and experimentation of symbiotic relationships can take place.

Ozone Factory (of the Future) - A. Angello Coarite Asencio – proposes an aerodynamic levitating globe of awareness.

FarmASeed – James Mitchell, Joel Kahn and Ahn Vu - focuses on Rifkin’s visions of empathy, zero marginal costs and sustainability, implemented through next generation of agricultural farming. The mission is to produce organic products without any genetic alterations or the use of pesticides. Visitors unite with farmers to produce and harvest these organic products, which are then later sold on the FarmaSeed market and the surrounding areas.

The Grid - Alejandro Carrillo, Borislav Schalev and Denis R. Li - Electrical Energy is the key factor for mankind evolution and at the same time is it Achilles heel, the demand of this precious resource keeps growing at exponential rates but our capacity to produce and transmit it is limited.

The exhibition experience started with the presentation of Sound to Polymer 1.0, developed by Hashem Joucka, proposing Electroactive polymers (EAPs) as a tool to adjust the acoustic performance of building interiors by using sound as an input to manipulate the space within, creating an enhanced indoor environmental quality. Orion Campos Gorrao Maoreira’s Touch Media proposal followed, aiming to create a new way of communication using and increasing our sense of touch by creating  a wearable tool with an open use, allowing 2 people to communicate through touch and vibrations.

The next 2 projects dealt with waste, from 2 diverse prospectives, and with 2 diverse finalities. The first was MegaWattsMegaWaste by Mahdi Najafi, a data sculpture that have been designed through a “Hacking Nature” process, making the audience and users aware of the huge amount of energy which is being wasted because of internet use. The proposal by Stephanie Farrah and Tanti Wulansari, the Unknown Desolate Transit, attempts to reveal urban and environmental issues: human driven technology is the tool to alter the installation, the user is enlightened by the problems and waste that their personal technology creates where communication between the user, the interface, and the installation creates a platform to heighten awareness while searching for a solution.

Spin your Story, by Deepti Dutt ,was the second last piece displayed, aiming to provoke proposing traditional methods of story telling elaborated with contemporary technology, generating a whole new sensorial experience. Finally the exhibition closed with Jayant Khanuja and Zuna Abdul Majid’s VirtuaLine, a physical environment responding to web based activity. The online world that we all live in now is actually underwater and somewhat invisible, but through this physical installation a space is created out of fiber optics bringing a sense of this unseen world.