Everyday life at the Institute for advanced architecture of Catalonia
For the previous session of Energy seminar Francesc Bonvehi. Mr. Bonvehí is a senior Industrial Engineer with over 30 years of professional experience. He has been active in the energy and building sectors acquiring network capability, responsiveness to deliver and entrepreneurial skills.
It has been an exciting week for the MAA students with guest workshops inside the theory seminar of the 1st term of the master. The past days Mark Bury has been sharing his knowledge with the MAA students by presenting some of his research related to Sagrada Familia construction and explaining how one can mix new technologies and techniques with an old project.
Mark Burry is a New Zeland architect, professor of innovation and Director of the Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory and also Executive Architect and Researcher at the Temple Sagrada Familia in Barcelona.
Students of the MAA at IAAC had the change to attend 2 class sessions with Michael Weinstock the passed days. Michael Weinstock is an architect, currently Director of Research and Development and Director of the Emergent Technologies and Design programme in the Graduate School of the Architectural Association School.
Michael Weinstock had two sessions with the students. During the first session Mike covered the subject of ¨evolution and computation¨ while at the second one he focused mostly in ¨system and cities¨. Mike Weinstock left IAAC after an Open Lecture that he gave at our Auditorium with the title: Metabolism of the City – the architecture of flows.
During the sessions he presented his research on metabolism life and its conection with computation systems. The human social aspect, climatology and ecology were some of the main points during his speech.
He spoke about the metropolis, superblock and tower. Also he left some reflection quotes/questions that could generate new questions:
‘Can we reanimate the city, reconnect and rewire the dream of the utopian metrópolis?’
‘Can we make intelligent infrastructures to integrate public spaces and natural ecology within cities?’
After more than one month of work, the 2011-2012 MAA Students presented their work as it was developed within the Introductory Studio class, tutored by Areti Markopoulou (IAAC Master program director) and Tomas Diez ( Fablab Barcelona manager ) with the assistance of Ioanna Spanou (Landscape Architect) and Tomas Vivanco Larrain (Architect). The presentations were divided in two sessions on the 9th-10th of November. The Jury board consisted of : Willy Muller( IAAC Founder, Director Barcelona Region Agency), Marta Malé-Alemany (IAAC Acting Director), Rodrigo Rubio -(IAAC Project Manager), Salvador Rueda (Ecosystema Urbana), Nacho Lopez- Architect, (Director Lagula Architects) and Gates Gooding,(Geographer/Anthropologist/ Expert in Urban and Environmental Planning Expert in Urban and Environmental Planning). The projects were mainly in the stage of research, several of the ideas intriguer for high quality results that could bring us closer to the idea of : ‘’MANY SLOW CITIES INTO A SMART CITY’’.
Vicente Guallart (founder of IAAC and recently chief Architect of Urban Habitat at Barcelona City Hall), last week started tutoring the 1st term Master Sessions of the MAA master.
Master sessions have the character of lectures and debates around the subject of contemporary and future cities. The debates are mainly driven by subjects of social, economical, cultural, informational and energetical impact on the planning and the function of modern cities as we are experiencing them now and how we vision them for the future.
The first session was devoted to the city of Barcelona, its urban history and its near future which is closely linked with the work that Vicente Guallart is currently developing at the Barcelona city Hall. What is a city? What is and always was the main factor of the cities function system constant change? What will be the pivotal point for the change of the cities as we know them now? Where should we architects look in order to find the answers needed for the planning of a sustainable environment in the ongoing expanding cities? These were some of the main questions that Vicente Guallart made to the students using a rather Socratic Method for the examination of his key concepts for the matter of the urban life and evolution.
Jochen Scheerer, ASEPMA director and comisión coordinator of water management in AQUA Spain, offered a special class to the MAA students dedicated to the cycle of water. Starting with the main point, where water is the basis of life and the question of how we as architects could manage it, depending where we are. During the lecture, Jochen Schreer tried to aruse the students awarness on the importance of water costs and their value. He provided to the students ideas, examples, data, as well as a large bibliography, were they could expant their research on the subject.
The students of the Open Thesis Fabrication had a VIP visit to Sagrada Familia the previous week . The tour was made by Andrés de Mesa and Jeronimo Buxaren, who made sure that the students get close to the ongoing works while the were able to access areas that are restricted for the touristes and eventualy see the insite part of the nativity facade, the part of the building that was overseen by Antonio Gaudi when the project started and before his death.