ArchiLab, the international laboratory of architecture, was created in 1999 by Marie-Ange Brayer and Frederic Migayrou in Orleans, France. It is an international laboratory engaged in research and experimentation, aiming to defend the young generation of architects, and presents the conceptual and pragmatic transformations taking place in the field of architecture.

In 1999, the first edition of ArchiLab explored the paradigm shift brought by the emergence of digital technologies within the newly emerging computational space.

The next edition, that is the 9^th, will take place in September, and will be dedicated to the interactions between digital architecture and life sciences (biotechnology, neurosciences, genetics, etc).

Today, the utilization of a new generation of software programs for designing architecture, along with techniques that make organic simulation possible, is enabling architects to explore the specific principles of evolution on the living realm with increasing precision. The same processes now revolutionizing the scientific disciplines, architecture, art and design, are being used by designers to achieve ever greater degrees of complexity. They are also bringing about a profound mutation in the very concept of nature.

During her presentation, Marie-Ange presented the works of some of the architects, designers and artists invited for the 9^th edition, such as Alisa Andrasek (www.biothing.org), Roland Snooks & Robert Stuart-Smith (www.kokkugia.com), Marc Fornes (http://theverymany.com), Andrew Kudless (http://matsysdesign.com), Skylar Tibbits (www.sjet.us), Neri Oxman (http://web.media.mit.edu/~neri/site/), Joris Laarman (www.jorislaarman.com), Achim Menges (www.achimmenges.com), Gramazio & Kohler (www.gramaziokohler.com) with Raffaello D’Andrea (http://raffaello.name), Theo Spyropoulos (www.minimaforms.com), Claudia Pasquera & Marco Poletto (www.ecologicstudio.com), Zoe Coombes & David Boira (www.commonwealth.nu), Thom Flauders (www.flauders-studio.com), B+U (www.bplusu.com), SOMA (www.soma-architecture.com), Ulrika Karlsson & Marcelyn Gow (www.servo-stockholm.com), Jenny Sabin (http://jennysabin.com), Akihisa Hirata (www.hao.nu), Kunya Ishigami (www.jnyi.jp), Matias del Campo Sandra Manninger (www.span-arch.com), Iris Van Herpen (www.irisvanherpen.com), Isaie Bloch (http://eragatory.blogspot.fr), Michael Hansmeyer (http://michael-hansmeyer.com), Casey Reas (http://reas.com), and Perry Hall (www.lovebrain.net).

Marie-Ange Brayer at IaaC

Lecture: “Naturalizing Architecture”
21st of May // 19:30 // IAAC Auditorium // C/Pujades 102 BARCELONA

Since 1996, Marie-Ange Brayer has been director of the Centre Regional Contemporary Art Collection [FRAC, Centre] in Orléans, France, where the collection is channelled towards the linkage between art and research architecture. The FRAC Centre has been putting together a collection to do with architecture in its utopian and experimental dimension, from the 1950s up until the present day. In 1999 she founded with Frédéric Migayrou the Orléans International Architectural Conference, ArchiLab, which brings together younger international practitioners involved in the latest forms of architecture.

In 2002, M.-A. Brayer was appointed with Béatrice Simonot as curator of the French Pavilion of the Venice Biennale of Architecture’s 8th International Exhibition of Architecture. In 2008, she was associate curator of the 3rd International Biennial of Contemporary Art of Seville (BIAC) for the “Youniverse” exhibition, with Peter Weibel as general curator. In 2013, she will curate ArchiLab « Naturalizing the architecture » with Frederic Migayrou. Art and architecture critic, Marie-Ange Brayer has published numerous articles in her domain in magazines and catalogs .She is currently working on a doctorate treating the architectural model since the Renaissance by tracing the history of its representation at the EHESS (School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences) in Paris.