arch-peace news and articles: Please use, digest, transfer, re-use, THEN recycle
14.7.09
5.6.09
building ecologies yui + flynn
Environmental sustainability is currently regarded as a critical issue to be addressed in architectural practice. Whilst the issue of sustainability pertains to a wide field of areas ranging from the technical to socio-political, the prevalent approach – evidenced by the numerous energy assessment tools available – appears to define sustainability as a measurable entity, defined narrowly within the parameters of a building’s sustainable technologies. Whilst the understanding and development of these technologies is important in a move towards a sustainable built environment, it seems to overlook the inherent problem which exists today: the social inertia towards environmental sustainability. Furthermore, it may be argued that over-emphasis on a building’s sustainable technologies has the potential to cultivate a mentality that technology will ‘take care of it’, resulting in a loss of responsibility over our own actions.
4.6.09
Reality and the Perceived Future in Architectural Decision Making
Here are my 6 A3 sheets which acted as support material for my submitted essay.
Abstract
This report seeks to investigate the role of reality and the perception of the 'perfect future' (utopia) in Architectural problem solving and decision making. It will evaluate a historical example (Le Corbusier's Ville Radieuse) in this light, which will be measured against the housing tenement blocks that are considered to be the result of Corbusier's proposals.
Finally, it will investigate the recently completed K2 Apartments by DesignInc in order to establish the role of the perceived future and reality in the modern context of architectural decision making. From this it is hoped that some basic lessons can be learnt about the decision making process in an Architectural context.
3.6.09
Is Creativity required in the making of sustainable architecture
What we are suggesting here is that the answer to the topic is open-ended. Everyone is working within his/her own reality. And each individual is creative as long as they are facing the reality because reality imposes external constraints, which then stimulates the creativity.
And to be creative, one has to be prepared, to take in knowledge in their field as much as they can, in order to maximise the probability of creativity.
2.6.09
29.5.09
Last week's threads...
Prompted by the presentations last Wednesday I mentioned some books and urban concepts that could assist you with your work, please find below some of these threads:
For urban public space (street project):
Gehl, Jan. Life Between Buildings: Using Public Space. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1987.
A great website dealing with the same topics discussed in the book at: http://www.pps.org/info/placemakingtools/placemakers/jgehl
Part of the PDF book can be downloaded from this website: http://a.parsons.edu/~creanm/interface/interface_readings/gehl_lifebtnbuld.1.pdf
Also check out Jane's Walk, a website dedicated to Jane Jacobs' work: http://www.janeswalk.net/
We also discussed some top-down approaches to the development of cities--Dubai and Brasilia were mentioned as examples. I suggested that comparison of cities such as these, conceived in different historical circumstances, need to consider the different social/ecological and economic context of today and that of some decades ago. Richard Sennett has extensively discussed the effect of these conditions in society and their resulting effect on cities, particularly in regards to people engagement or capacity to engage in social processes (including solidarity and democracy). See for example: "Fighting the flexible firm" and "Capitalism and the City". See also:
http://on1.zkm.de/zkm/stories/storyReader$1513
http://mondediplo.com/2001/02/16cities
and book in www.scribd.com, "The Culture of New Capitalism"
Finally, we talked about Rem Koolhaas and (in my view) his often contradictory critique to the current social/political and economic conditions--a critique that does not prevent him from successfully using these conditions to exercise a top-down approach to urbanism. Two articles reflect his views and perhaps epitomize his postmodern approach:
Koolhaas, Rem. "Junkspace." October, no. 100 (Spring 2002): 175-190. http://www.btgjapan.org/catalysts/rem.html
Koolhaas, Rem, and Sanford Kwinter. Rem Koolhaas : Conversations with Students, Architecture at Rice University 30. Houston, Tex: New York : Rice University School of Architecture; Princeton Architectural Press, 1996. (Available from the ABP library)
See you all on Wednesday. Presentations will run for 7 minutes and 3 min. for comments from your classmates, Prof Louis Sauer and I. Find details of your presentation and essay requirements in the website under Programe.
Beatriz C. Maturana
17.5.09
Grocon awarded bushfire cleanup contract
Stumbled on an obscure bushfire-related link while doing some research for another project.
http://www.grocon.com.au/pdfs/melbourne/BushfireCleanup.pdf
further links:
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25116284-661,00.html
It is interesting because Grocon are known for their work with concrete-based construction. Eureka tower is an extremely unusual building because it is a concrete-based extra-tall skyscraper, rather then the usual steel frame.
Many of the residents of the bushfire areas were concerned about ending up in over-regulated concrete bunkers that would destroy their lifestyles in order to make them fire-safe. It is interesting that Grocon has won the contract for this job, as it would seem that the Government is indeed leaning towards concrete-based reconstruction. It should be noted that the contract is just for clean-up and demolition, but I'd imagine this would position the company excellently for reconstruction tenders.
15.5.09
dream, time and reality
Yue and Hannah are investigating how imagination acts as the medium of understanding
the healthy ecologies of land by human minds. Through the study on ‘Walking City’
and other un-built imaginary architecture, the expression of discontentment with their
reality while seeking to a ‘dream land’ is explored. From there, issues arised
politically, socially, economically, environmentally are analyzed corresponding to
particular period of time. By discovering these, we would able to identify the roots
and the social demand for sustainable developments. Cases such as ‘Palm Islands’
will also be investigated as a contemporary approach to how people are trying to
create sustainable ' fantasy' place.
blog properly. We have to use Kelvin's account to blog it.
Thanks for his help.
Imagination&Reality: It's role in Ecotopias
Nicole and Jingyi are looking at the role of reality and imagination in the steps towards a more sustainable future, and designs of Ecotopias. They argue that the roles of reality, imagination and the future are all interlinked and inform eachother in a continuous cycle. As a case study, they are investigating how the design elements of Ecocity, Dongtan, has responded to reality and imagination, and affect our future.
ImaginationShow&Tell
Publish at Scribd or explore others:
13.5.09
PLAY: Understanding sustainability through experience of materials
Samantha and Cherie are researching the role of play of Understanding sustainability through the experience. Experiential play in our approach is the hands on learning process of understanding sustainability. Every small step of educating the society to change the worlds' take on sustainability makes a difference, and several model projects were taken to study the success of them. The Greenhouse by Joost, the Notley Green Primary School and the Children's Activity Centre (Melbourne) by Phooey Architects were chosen based on its high interaction with its users.
Sam and Cherie
Publish at Scribd or explore others:
PLAY - Show and Tell
Justin and George are investigating the role that play can have in the design process. Analysing the Uluru-Kata Tjuta Aboriginal Cultural Centre using a model based on a psychoanalytic and sociological interpretation of play, they argue that play is means of communication which fosters creativity, builds trust and ultimately uncovers hidden truths, all which can lead to more socially sustainable design outcomes.
pLAY Show & Tell
Publish at Scribd or explore others: Screenplays & Plays How-to-Guides & Manu Non-fiction ed2009show & tell
10.5.09
8.5.09
Presentation by Prof Louis Sauer
Presentation by Prof Louis Sauer on his extensive work. Prof Sauer presented some of his residential and urban design work to ED2009 tutorial group, University of Melbourne, 6 May 2009.
Presentation by Prof Louis Sauer
Louis Sauer: an architectural statement
Focus: The Low-rise Housing Work of Louis Sauer, Toshi Jukatu Journal of Urban Housing,
(Kajima Institute, Tokyo), pp 6 – 7, January 1980 (monograph)
Architecture is a process and a product of civilization for solving specific man-environment problems. As a process, it is an intrinsically cultural and economic action, involved with complex issues and varied participants, to achieve political purposes through technology. To the extent that the interactions of these forces, issues and participants are understood, one can become more effective in predicting and modifying the outcomes of the designed environment. By understanding the separate goals and disciplines of the individual participants in each aspect of housing, architects can intervene for greater influence upon the quality of housing and its environment.
ARCHITECTURAL BELIEF
The values and attitudes of architects are the most powerful determinants of their work. The open door to change is to understanding and working with these values and their resultant accountabilities. In order to make design choices, one must advocate a particular set of values and thus, architecture is a political process and product.
DESIGN: A PROCESS AND PRODUCT
For the architect to be in control, to be able to modify his work for predictive results, he should understand the nature of the various participants, their power and the incremental goals and resources for each of them and for each phase of the work. Design programming is dynamic and is directly linked to formal design — each design tool (site plan, elevation, detail, etc.) is in fact a synthetic statement of program and solution. This should be seen as a contingent process. Evaluative criteria are rarely explicit for those very areas most essential to the quality of architectural form. Architects are aware and highly sensitive to the values of their clients and peer group, and to the extent that these represent larger societal interests, to this extent will these larger interests be incorporated into the design program.
ARCHITECTURAL PRECONDITIONS
Normally a people develop homogeneous traditions, forms and infrastructure that satisfy their shelter needs. But when populations change and or become heterogeneous in terms of lifestyle and cultural expectancies old traditions no longer satisfy needs, and an architect's implicit understanding of the environment no longer solves the problems.
In these situations man-environment architectural relationships need to be made explicit, in order to predict the user’s fit with the final designed artefact. One problem today is that many architects understand the values of the programmer and are not sensitive to when the user’s value differ from those of the programmer. But substantial social knowledge is available to help the architect and programmers. The need for this is understood. What is not understood are the non-architectonic conditions necessary for the successful creation and use of architecture.
The final product of the architect is not under his control. To produce a lasting architecture the inter-relationship between land, finances, users, management and architectural form should be understood; however, architectural form is perhaps the least necessary to regulate – to control.
BUILDING TYPOLOGIES
Cultures produce traditions of building that efficiently solve shelter problems. This tradition, in the form of building typologies (site, building and unit), is generally given to the architect. It is only the abnormal and non-generic situation that allows the architect to produce forms outside of the tradition (e.g. Habitat by Moshe Safdie).
7.5.09
Adam's Work: Summary for Presentation Lecture
Here is my slide for the presentation lecture.
Adam Markowitz is investigating utopia, and the perception of the 'perfect future', and why Utopian ideals fail to engage with reality in the formulation of their doctrines.
In this vein, he is looking into the impact of Utopian ideals on planned public housing, by first investigating Corb's 'Radiant City', both the causative effects for this theory, and the proposed solutions.
He will then appraise these Utopian concepts in light of the mass tenement blocks that were the offspring of Corb's ideals, in order to investigate how such 'top-down' utopian planning failed to grapple with the 'bottom-up' needs on the ground, and understand why such facilities are considered such social failures.
Finally, he intends to investigate a modern planned public housing facility, K2 Apartments, which is being promoted by the state government as the 'sustainable future' in terms of medium-rise high density housing. He will appraise whether or not this project is dealing with the reality on the ground, or is blinded by top-down utopian ideals.
Assignment - Kelvin & Tracy
Kelvin and Tracy - for presentation
Kelvin and Tracy are exploring the relationship between Reality and Creativity.
They both have agreed on that, apart from the Physical reality of matters, ie. everything we interact with the world with basic senses, there are also Reality that does not exist physically but mentally. They are products created by human beings such as Culture and Economy.
For Creativity, they believe that it is not something out of the thin air. Creativity is heavily rooted to the past experience and inspired by experiments. As a result, one must take in as much knowledge as he can in order to discover the chance for creativity.
To apply creativity to sustainability, one must studies the structure and reason for sustainability and experiment with different tools and model that we address the Real issues of the sustainable real world.
2.5.09
Final submission: June 3, 2009
Assignment 4 is made up of 2 parts (both are important):
1. an essay of 1500-2000-words
2. and an analysis of a project from the point of view of your research topic (6xA3 pages min.)—we will discuss the total number of pages closer to the submission date.
Exercise from last week - Utopia vs Reality in Planned Public Housing Estates
Exercise from last week.
The collage posters are intended to be read in relation to one and other as a series.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/14844956/Collage-1-Le-Corbusier-and-the-Ville-Radieuse
http://www.scribd.com/doc/14844978/Collage-2-Planned-Public-Housing-in-the-postwar-years
http://www.scribd.com/doc/14845024/Collage-3-K2-Apartments-a-modern-approach-to-public-housing
1.5.09
tomorrows thoughts today
stumbled across this blog with a pretty ambitious mission statement :
"exploring the consequences of fantastic, perverse and underrated urbanisms"
.... maybe worth a look
29.4.09
28.4.09
23.4.09
Sustainability / Trans-disciplinarity:
A concern for people and environments between confusing terminology and outdated approaches
Ashraf M. Salama, Ph.D.
Professor of Architecture
INTBAU: Sustainability / Trans-disciplinarity, A Concern for People and Environments between Confusing Terminology and Outdated Approaches
The proposed approach adopts the view that sustainability cannot be addressed as one subject; it includes different disciplines and issues requiring systemic thinking. A fuller understanding can be achieved by investigating the key issues simultaneously; not dealing with them separately each at a time. It is envisioned that this approach would include technology and engineering issues; organizational, human and management issues; functional, behavioral and cultural issues; financial issues; and urban and landscape issues. It is also believed that these issues should be integrated within a political, legislative, comprehensive process while learning from the past; the vernacular, the traditional, and the development practices that acquired meaning over time.
(...)
The Existence of Creativity
This is a very casual conversation of me and my friend who psychology. We talked about the topic of the Existence of Creativity on 29-03-2009. We had our non-official conclusion on the topic. It's really casual, but I think it's interesting so I share.
fire lemon says: u may only want to focus on the Conclusion part feel free feel free to kill me Geoffardy says: then how do you explain abstract in relation to logic and reasoning? fire lemon says: random accessing experience? a way of brain functioning? Geoffardy says: so are abstract thoughts part of creativity? fire lemon says: stimulated by past experience and ..... u know, i'm messed up too, but just didn't feel right about the whole concept i have doubt it's like asking a baby to create the shape Triangle but without seeing Line, how can they 'create' Triangle and is it really possible that the image Triangle suddenly jump out from the baby's mind? i was thinking that everything we have is from the earth what improve human history is the Accident Geoffardy says: i see what you mean you're saying that people create things through pre-existing knowledge fire lemon says: yes Geoffardy says: what about our ancestors? fire lemon says: Accident what i mentioned in my paper the Accident contact with the physical world Geoffardy says: which is pretty much "trial and error" that you sorta rejected? fire lemon says: nono trial and error is the God i mean sorry i mean the MOST IMPORTANT THING Geoffardy says: hmmm fire lemon says: um um what do u think Geoffardy says: do you think babies dream? fire lemon says: wow... could be but what about before born? Geoffardy says: if they do, does it mean there's creativity involved? fire lemon says: but dreaming could be about experience past experience isn't that what u guys say? dream is the re-organising data in brain Geoffardy says: yeah but newborn babies, without data, how do they dream? fire lemon says: do they hear at the time they born? it could be made of sounds only just like the way a blind person can't dream Images but sounds but once he's not blind anymore, he starts to see images Geoffardy says: that's not totally right let me look that up fire lemon says: okok it has been bothering me, i have a lot of questions about the mind and body and how we experience the world Geoffardy says: ok fire lemon says: haha Geoffardy says: blind people who're born blind do not see images in their dreams fire lemon says: yea~! Geoffardy says: they experience the other sensory information but not visual HOWEVER if a newborn had seen something, light or shapes or humans, and then becomes blind, that newborn will still see images in his/her dreams even when he grows up to be an adult fire lemon says: yea! Geoffardy says: and that image can be something different, or created basing on 1 or 2 visual experiences fire lemon says: so his experience will be like 'this' little, so the 'creativity' will be almost none yea! Geoffardy says: so if he has seen a straight line, cos he's been looking at the ceiling where there's a string hung around, i'm not surprised that he can imagine a triangle from it fire lemon says: really!?!?!?!?!?!??!?! right but still Geoffardy says: all it takes is just something fire lemon says: the triangle is made of lines Geoffardy says: as minimal as it can be fire lemon says: he can enver made something out of line Geoffardy says: although they can't see but they can probably imagine it in their head let's say if you take them by the hand and trace out a circle with their finger, chances are they can imagine how a circle looks like in their head... now that image is created only through imagination/creativity fire lemon says: wait, but what if we minimize the case to nothing but a line in head nothign else a baby with a line in head with no more knowledge or contact with anyone else forever Geoffardy says: what i said before was for someone who's born blind fire lemon says: he's still undergoing Mental Trial and Error only Geoffardy says: just ask them to imagine and they can imagine fire lemon says: o.... o....... but what can they imagine? imagination must base on Experience unless he can Create unless Real Creativity exist Geoffardy says: imagination is based on some experience not all of it fire lemon says: i mean the illusion that we 'can create' is that we have experienced the world so much Geoffardy says: you don't have to see an object to imagine it i can describe it to you by words, and you can probably form it in your head fire lemon says: but Language contains Experience Language is so an artifical thing one needs to understand the world before understanding Language Language is the summary of human Experience gathered through history not unless we have direct brain communication Geoffardy says: language doesn't contain visual information for a blind person so it has nothing to do with him being able to see in his head fire lemon says: but how can a born blind people going to know what is a line Geoffardy says: as i said all you need to do is to ask them to imagine take them by the hand, hold their finger, and trace a straight line with that finger fire lemon says: right Geoffardy says: and they can imagine it fire lemon says: but then u're importing Spatial imformantion to a blind what if u are not allowed to give them a Spatial Experience to him? Geoffardy says: ask them to imagine a 3D object in their head, they can do it fire lemon says: there's a book called Johnny Got A Gun something Geoffardy says: spatial information is only relevant to a sighted person what we're giving him is tactile information, the sense of touch but for him, a blind person, to translate tactile information to visual information, it needs a lot of creativity and imagine on his part it's creative because it doesn't necessarily mean that he's imagining the exact same thing because he can't see colour fire lemon says: o~~~~~~ Geoffardy says: but the fact that he's imagine something fire lemon says: right i heard of that one too they tell blue to him Geoffardy says: something that resembles to the object in question now that's creativity fire lemon says: but he imagined something else Geoffardy says: yeah fire lemon says: that's cool Geoffardy says: there's research that says that the part where visual information is processed in the brain is activated when a blind person is asked to trace or feel something fire lemon says: how can he create that colour... Geoffardy says: yeah fire lemon says: haha Geoffardy says: it's pure imagination http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6SYR-4T3M6B4-7&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=f4f9402e71f622441cd863aa23c3ed8b fire lemon says: o...... wait!!!!!!!! wait!!!! but it's not fia fair coz u know we have cases saying that some genius can see colours when they are calculating is it possible that it is the overlayin of the brain process that allow the blind to do that? Geoffardy says: those are not genius fire lemon says: can one argue that 5 senses are sepearated? or in fact just one big experience? Geoffardy says: they are savants, a form of autism 自閉綜合症 fire lemon says: o~~ Geoffardy says: 5 senses are separated in different parts of the brain but there's an associative network that connects them fire lemon says: shit... i'm trying to argue the brain but what if colours is already pre-exist in human's brain? before born Geoffardy says: nah fire lemon says: the logic of human, the logic of the structure of the eyeball it's just the mapping is different Geoffardy says: u can't see in your mother's womb cos it's so dark nah you can't even open your eyes how can u see colour fire lemon says: no, i'm just the biological fact of the eyes to inspires colour Geoffardy says: u wouldn't even know how to breathe cos u didnt need to lol fire lemon says: no.... right Geoffardy says: no, i don't think a baby has prior knowledge of the world before they're born unless they are reincarnated 投胎 fire lemon says: haha cool Geoffardy says: then we'll have to ask 閻羅王why he/she didn't drink the 孟婆湯 fire lemon says: HEY!!!!! HEY!!! WTF!!! wait@@@@ see!!!! Can someone imagine the 6th sense? tell me Geoffardy says: how totally yeah totally fire lemon says: um....................................... Geoffardy says: i felt someone beside me all the time lol fire lemon says: hahaha Geoffardy says: and girls claim to have it fire lemon says: in this sense our theory will go further that human are able to create the 6 7 8 th sense? that it is possible* but Feeling could be a form of the Touching sense 6th 7th 8th mean something out of the 5 senses u see, you're trying to use Touch to inspire a blind to 'see' in this sense, we human will be able to inspire 6th sense with 5 sense as a result, it proves the existence of 6th sense the N th senses this conversation is just purely inspiring.. i'll save it.. hey, but after all, we still can not prove that Creativiity can exist on 1 individual sense the example u have given is 1 sense inspired by another sense doesn't mean Vision can create Vision by itself
My initial point is that Creativity does not exist. Turns out that we find something imaginative.
firelemon = Me
Geoffardy = Geoffardy
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