reACT by design IDW 2022 14.02—18.02 International Design Workshop Week University of Antwerp / Faculty of Design Sciences in collaboration with Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp
Re-ACT by Design Re-ACT by Design is the theme of an annual series of international workshop weeks for master students architecture, interior architecture, product development, heritage studies, urbanism and spatial planning, of the Faculty of Design Sciences at the University of Antwerp as well as for students of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of the AP University College. “It might be said that what is offered in research and education should be determined by the challenges that are being articulated in the lines of fracture of society itself.”1 The aimof the international workshop weeks is to explore the power and capacity of design to tackle those lines of fracture and socially engage by design. Beyond re-search by design, students and tutors re-act by design. How can design education not only address students, but also address those lines of fracture, and induce debates, provoke questions, and set an agenda? The workshop is open to radical pedagogical experiences, which open the eyes, change sides and widen thinking. It stimulates crossing disciplinary boundaries. It provides a forum for international exchange and it is an informal platform for discussing arts and design education and their agency. IDW2022 will be the third edition in a row that focusses on what is seen as the most epic construction project of Antwerp in theXXI century: the capping of the ring road. If the ring road is seen as, an almost literal, line of fracture, how then can the capping of the road be seen as sealing the fracture, and setting an agenda towards a better world? 1 Simons, M. (2006). ‘Education Through Research’ at European Universities: Notes on the Orientation of Academic Research. Journal of Philosophy of Education, 40(1), 31-50. common common common common common common common common common 1
3 2 is not the user; an (interior)architect designs a house but is not the one who will inhabit it; the artist realizes a work of art in order to be experienced by others; ….). IDW believes that making design ideas more tangible during fun events, design sessions and building campaigns not only involves and engages residents that usually don’t attend participation events, but also increases the awareness of the residents about the issues at stake. Moreover it is a chance to highlight communities’ existence, their needs and potentials. We believe that design is able to trigger parties, to provoke interactions between actors that have not been identified before, and inspire for solutions that have not yet been thought of. IDW2020 looked upon the capping of ring road as the creation of a new urban common. It focused on the Northern part of the ring road, more particularly the connection between Luchtbal and Lambrechtshoeken, and aimed at giving voice to those groups and communities that are not reached by regular participatory approaches and at revealing qualities of places that were overlooked. It was an edition in which the whole area and connection between both neighborhoods were explored. IDW2021 continued this endeavor, in spite of rigid COVID restrictions. It focused on culture - culture as an emanation of what was and what is, but also as a space where future is made. Culture is performative. Cultural “performance” gives exposure to both “what lives among people” and “how the world could become”. Next to local groups, communities and individuals, the edition specifically targeted youngsters of Luchtbal. IDW2022 expands the scope of targeted actors, and next to local groups, communities and individuals, now particularly reaches out to schools (children of 10 -14 year old). It explores the statement that infrastructural works are not primarily a matter of engineering, but of culture. Wicked problems, such as the capping of the road, call for holistic approaches. Arts and Architecture provide the way to bring Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics into the realm of society and culture. From STEM to STEA²M STEA²M for the MEANTIME Digging tunnels and covering them, is a huge infrastructural work. It is a good example of how Science has given birth to Technologies, that have led to Engineering, strongly relying upon advanced application of Mathematics, the well-known STEM-unity. However, its impact is societal and – thus – cultural. Engineering is no goal in itself. While the goal of the tunneling is to have traffic swiftly pass the city, the covering of that very same tunnel becomes a new place in that city, a place that is an offer to the citizens of a fast rejuvenating city! How can huge infrastructural works be understood from the cultural context in which they intrinsically take place, and to which they intrinsically belong? How can the ‘meantime’ of the construction works become a period of meaningful transition and empowerment, rather than a temporary nuisance and burden? How can conceptions of such huge infrastructures primarily include cultural concerns, rather than traffic concerns. IDWstates that Art and Architecture provide fruitful ways to do so. While STEM is limited and problematic, STEA²M is rich and promising. (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Architecture and Mathematics). Designing the Meantime The capping of the Antwerp ring road creates new opportunities. On the one hand it offers an answer to the supralocal problem of traffic flow around and through Antwerp, on the other hand, at local level it offers the adjacent neighborhoods a new place for urban live. For both levels, the supralocal and the local, conceptual design proposals have been made. What has not or insufficiently been done yet, is to develop ideas about the quality of urban live during the time of construction, which can be estimated at 10 to 15 years – the duration in which a child becomes a youngster and a youngster adult. How can this timespan become a meaningful given in the creation of a better future for this area and its inhabitants? The central design-action question: How can the long term of the construction works become a period of meaningful transition and empowerment, rather than a temporary, but one decade long, nuisance and burden? IDW Luchtbal considers the timespan of the construction works as a unique opportunity for the city and the involved neighborhoods to gradually rearrange and transform this area into a fair and vibrant piece of Antwerp. The area of Luchtbal has a remarkable history and a diverse and complicated population today. Although it might be known as a “difficult urban area”, its tangible and intangible heritage, its vast open space and young population provide rich grounds for getting such process of transition started. IDW Luchtbal aims at identifying and revealing “what lives among people” – particularly young people – and providing help in giving it a proper “place”. In IDW the “D” of design is understood as a process of identifying available resources, actors and ideas, and bringing them into a new constellation, in order to reveal something better then could be expected so far. Design is always meant to be owned by someone else (a product developer conceives a new product but Arts and Design turning infrastructure into a cultural endeavor. From STEM to STEA²M. How can huge infrastructural transformation be understood from the cultural context in which they intrinsically take place? How can the ‘meantime’ of the construction works become a period of meaningful transition and empowerment?
Interdisciplinary workshops architecture fine arts heritage studies interior architecture product development urbanism and spatial planning 5 3 2 1 # 0 1 (t)Active Routes by Stijn Rybels “tactive”| adjective; engaged in active travel through tactical interventions Mapping the routes; active travel from a child’s perspective Children are faced with a number of spatial (and socio-economic) barriers to active travel that are similar to other groups in general but have some specific differences. In a first stage we will try to understand the current barriers to active travel for children travelling to school by mapping the routes of the children by accompanying them from school to home. By using the walk-along and cycle-along technique we will either walk or cycle along with the children in their own environment. This will enable the students to get detailed information on how the children experience, see, hear, feel and interact with their environment during their route from school to home. Through mapping techniques these routes and barriers will be visualized. Tactical interventions; hard- and orgware through a collaborative design process In a second stage we will seek for (temporary) tactical interventions in the built environment through a collaborative design process to promote and stimulate active travel to school. Besides physical interventions (hardware) alsoorganisational mechanisms (orgware) are explored based on the barriers that were identified in the mapping process. Image 1 Tactical Urbanism Materials and Design Guide workshop: www.tacticalurbanismguide.com Image 2 Iedereen Gorilla: www.iedereengorilla.be Image 3 Orientation Diagram Donald Appleyard, Kevin Lynch and John Myer, The view from the Road: Cambridge: Massachusetts M.I.T Press, 1964, 52
6 7 1 2 3 1 2 3 # 0 2 “When they woke up, the dinosaur was still there.” The Dinosaur, Augusto Monterroso, 1959 From above, we see a road, in a ring, a pulsating drivosaur laid out in the-places-that-avoid-and-separatemore-important-places. From the ground, we see individual vehicles, two-ton monsters carrying humans and cargoes: Herring from Stockholm, Haggis from Aberdeen, Marcolini Chocolates, Cheese from the Balearic Islands. Modest use of brains: steering, braking, choosing another lane, or another track, fingers tapping to music on the steering wheel. We see the dusty bustle of trucks, tractors, and bulldozers. At night the drivosaur becomes a snake of colour and light, passing without beginning or end. When this drivosaur goes underground, which it will, perhaps with a fumeless electric whirr, it will still be there. Meanwhile, we imagine. This workshop will look ahead to the ghost vehicles of the ring-road. We invite students to collaborate with school children to imagine and construct drivosaurs that will be drawn, modelled and constructed as 1:1 mobile urban interventions in Luchtbal. Tissue and paper models first, bring your hairdryer, filming the traffic go by, day and night, making and running with some bigger prototypes. Reveal the drivosaur! DRIVOSAUR by Oliver Froome-Lewis & Penélope Plaza # 0 3 The confessioal booth: renewing spatial contracts of Luchtbal by Sabrina Morreale & Lorenzo Perri (Lemonot) What are the spaces across scales that enable us to come together differently, to have new forms of conversation or to change our behaviours, habits and rituals? All forms of engagements need to be designed. Through the construction of this confessional, we will discuss new spatial contracts that could be formed by collective acts of negotiation, contamination and disclosure. Wewill use fiction as a strategyof understanding power dynamics - students will work on switching roles in this inhabitable scenography - an itinerant and inhabitable device inviting different audiences to reach us. The confessional will act as a spatial framework, where everyone is invited to discuss strategies of resistance. What do you fear? What do you consider a support structure? Those conversations will become virtual scenarios and layered filmic sequences. The odd, the uncanny, the uncomfortable, the disproportionate, will be guiding principles against the norm, with the intention to reveal and intensify uncharted ordinary rituals - potential thresholds to live in Luchbal in the next 15 years. We will create a common vocabulary - a lexicon of usership - in which the confessionswill become away to initiate newcollaborations sharing tools as a form of co-ownership. A safe space, in which confidentiality and camouflaging will become our form of protection - turning the audience from spectators to future owners of the urban space.
8 9 3 2 1 1 2 3 # 0 4 CITYHIJACK by Fabian Tobias Reiner & Sven Högger Extended infrastructure has always been a driver of progress, yet its linearity and energetic power create unwanted borders and nuisances. Therefore, it is favourably put underground. With the ring road, another infrastructural necessity will be hidden away from sight, made believe its non-existence. However, the moment a stream scratches the earth’s surface, we come to admire a miraculous mountain spring, the quick roaring of a hundred foreign trucks, or perhaps a warm breeze from the metro exhaust air. The experience’s immediacy is key to our delight. We introduce to the students and the local school children a broader understanding of—as well as a radical empathy towards—infrastructural flux and its urban impact. Walks, discussions and lectures will accompany us during the week to better recognize the potentials of superposed urbanism. We will scour Luchtbal for national and global networks underneath local soil. Construction sites already lay bare the veins pumping the city’s elixir. In groups of four, the students will reveal and access the infrastructural flux through text, drawings, metaphors. Each group will construct a small installation that exploits the potentials of the site. We seek to detour the flowof goods like electricity, water or exhaust air in one specific place in order tomake it visible. Feasible projects such as a new fountain or an ephemeral light showwill create an aura around the site; will create a sense of belonging. # 0 5 Path of Play by Alexandra Sonnemans & Caterina Viguera (rotative studio) Path of Play is a sequence of interactive elementary structures that pop up in Antwerpen Luchtbal. Introducing play as a form of design – as a new way of experiencing and imagining space through interaction, improvisation and suggestion – participants are invited to establish a dialogue with the existing context to uncover new potential places. Participants will start by selecting specific open public spaces and create and install five distinct structures. - These interactive structures are tactile, transformable artefacts (metal tubes and strings) that are meant to be touched, stretched and twisted into various geometrical figures, suggesting space through minimal means. - They act as anthropomorphic elements that mediate between body and space, with the body as the unit of measure and as a tool to modify and create spaces (and confer significance). - Their adaptability allows participants to generate new places, infusing themwith personal and cultural values, creating new common meaning. Playingwith the structures in the susceptiblemoment of the meantime, can foster reconstructions of space from primary notions such as the topological relationships of proximity, separation, order, enclosure, as well as open up a dialogue on cultural and historical continuity. By the end of the week, Path of Play will be handed over to the community as a large-scale ‘drawing of potentiality’, resulting from all the interactions.
10 11 3 2 1 1 2 3 # 0 6 # 0 7 karkas: sculptural intervention at Luchtbal by Willem Coenen & Aline Veelaert (Atelier Scheldeman) karkas functions as a three dimensional framework to set up brainstorm sessions about how to intervene architecturally in the urban landscape. We’re aiming to design and build, on site, scale 1:1, in one week. Driven by dreams of local kids, who we see as clients, we will translate and develop a concept, until a tactile installation. karkas reacts as a tangible toolbox leading and showing the possibilities of modular building principes. It consists of elements and knots, offering a building method to workshop participants. The orthogonal lay-out leads to clear constructive choices, creating conceptual and spatial freedom. As a starting point we present an interactive site plan to local children. The scale of their neighborhood, personal environment, movements and connections will be analysed through a kid’s eye. Searching the interrelation between building blocks, water, roads, greenzones, ladders and other fragments of the environment as an introduction to the creation of architectural and urban links. What is a link? A mental visual or physical connection? How are links made in nature? Howdo links work between human beings? Which links will be created in the oosterweel-future? Which links would you like to make? Rethinking / Relinking the neighborhood offers podium to create dreamy utopian interventions in their future playground. Searching for NewBabylon by Diego Inglez de Souza & Julien Ineichen In 1963, the situationist artist Constant Nieuwenhuys drew his plans for the New Babylon over Antwerp maps. This illustration of the unitary urbanism utopic and futuristic city created connections and layers of collective spaces to offer the citizens unpredicted situations, new possibilities of interaction and meeting. Using the transformations that will take place with the ring capping as a starting point, we pretend to stress the relation between the possible and the desirable urban situations during the meantimes with unexpected uses of the public spaces. Our aim is to unveil the imaginary of New Babylon over Antwerp in our days, designing collectively a new cartography to represent pre-existences, emergences and the desire of its actual inhabitants. Over a public space in Luchbtal, directly on the urban ground, we will draw with cray and paint our version of a gigantesque New Babylon map to building an ephemeral situation of play that will discuss connections and interactions on Antwerp nowadays, fading away after some time and rain. This ephemeral cartography will be designed and debated by students and local youngsters through participatory dynamics and a hands-on urban intervention. Like a hopscotch, it will stimulate a joyful and playful situation for the direct interaction of the inhabitants with the representation of their city and expectedexpecting.
12 13 3 2 1 1 2 3 # 0 8 # 0 9 Living Equipment: Portable Spaces by Inés Ballesteros & Michela Dal Brollo How can we facilitate the projection and activation of temporary common spaces designing and using a shelter as a research tool? The workshopwill start in “Archipel” atelier with an introduction about the project “Living Equipment: Portable Spaces”, presenting the tools we will use to collaborate with a chosen location within Lucthbal. The equipment consists of a portable: oven, printing atelier, shelter, map and multifunctional cargo bike. After that wewill walk around Luchtbal andwork on our map looking for locations and urban elements to instal the shelter. How can we perform the shelter to infiltrate liminal spaces of the neighborhood and contribute to their future meanings? During the second and the third day we will set up the structure together with the students, looking at how it can adapt and collaborate with the chosen location. During the fourth day wewould like to collaboratewith the school to imaging togheter the possible activations that the shelter can host in the future, recording ideas and notes with the portable printer. Which kind of activities and actions are demanded or needed by the neighbours of Lucthbal? How can a temporary installation be part of a long term “pollination process” inspiring future actions and provoking newquestions? For the last day the structure will be activated with the portable oven, preparing food and creating a collective moment where the participants can share their thoughts about what happened during the week. LOVERS JUST FORONE DAY by Philippe Buchs & Angélique Kuenzle (SUJETS OBJETS/) I, I can remember (I remember) / Standing, by the wall (by the wall) / And the guns, shot above our heads (over our heads) / And we kissed, as though nothing could fall (nothing could fall) / And the shame, was on the other side / Oh we can beat them, for ever and ever - David Bowie Byproducts and Side effects The roads have produced an entire ecosystem yet to disappear. Petrol stations, car wash, parkings, drifts, neon lights, rodeos, rave parties and graffitis, the life under the bridges which carry the highways will be for one last time the hero of the performances to come. The workshop will be structured in three temporalities: We will explore the site by walking under and beside the highway. Wewill meet the users of the ring road, we will drive, we will dance, we will scream. A precise and sensible cartography of places under extinction will be made. A selection of the identified, condemned spaces will be made. They will consequently be activated through performances and architectural fragments. The experience will be immersive and beautiful. Just for one day.
14 15 1 2 3 1 2 3 # 1 0 # 1 1 SOFT URBAN EDGES by Alberto Pottenghi & Mariana Sendas (MONOatelier) Following the reasons that prompted us to reflect on how to tame the large infrastructures present in the area, during the IDW2020 edition, we keep going with the theme of soft urban edges. Reflecting on the meaning of a new, strong, intrusive element in a community that is often not ready to accept the change of a territory. If we can identify moments in which this great intruder can offer a new scenario capable of hosting the community instead of rejecting it, offering opportunities instead of denying them. Students will be asked to design using simple elements, as curtains or modular elements, to build new partitions and achieve the creations of new spaces where different activities events could take place. Once again, by using soft surfaces, as curtains or panels, the transition of the form is natural because they move in and out or they can catch the light or shade. Art and architecture as tools capable of restoring the feeling of common ownership, of appropriation of, apparently, subtracted or radically changed public spaces, subject to a big change. Art and architecture as tools to ensure that the local community will be the protagonist of this change. “Every human being is an artist, a freedom being, called to participate in transforming and reshaping the conditions, thinking and structures that shape and inform our lives.” - Joseph Beuys PERFORMING DEVICES by Adrien Meuwly, Adrien Comte (Comte/Meuwly) & Theo de Meyer Luchtbal, a territory in transformation. The workshop aims to raise awareness of the existing specificities and qualities genuinely gathered in an underestimated territory, which are threatened by its foreseen large-scale transformation. Luchtbal – as it is today - is our Eldorado. Somany potentials and possibilities are embedded in today’s territory: the generosity of the common spaces, mostly left aside as wastelands, magnificent leftover in-between giant mall’s parking and industrial halls, and the resources to be found or reused, from the junk of recycling plants to the assortment of the DIYmarkets. All of these potentials and resources are gathered in Luchtbal, waiting to be assembled to reveal excitement. The participants will be asked to produce performative devices by combining the richness of a rediscovered place (1/3), the resources found and re-used onsite (1/3), and the endless assortment of the DIY markets (1/3). The sitewill by our laboratory. The junk our trigger. The DIYmarket our catalyser. The performative devices are going to are to be implemented on specific sites, triggering reaction of the passers- by, raising awareness.
16 17 1 2 # 1 2 # 1 5 mean-time²-gate by Anđelka Bnin-Bninski The meantime timegate, or the mean-time²-gate examines the spatial and cultural potentials of the construction site boundaries for the capping of the Antwerp ring road. Starting from the very notion of boundary as a multilayered concept of various limits, the space-time relation is considered as a platform for contextual explorations and the act of the threshold design tactics, tailored for the Luchtbal and Lambrechtshoeken neighborhoods. The workshop takes approximate meantime period of the construction site (10 – 15 yrs) as an interval for social and cultural experimentation and unfolding. The mean-time²-gate as a relation between the space and time is considered a specific research tool and the main outcome of the workshop. The precise positioning within the micro-political context provokes nuanced critical attitude and awareness to evolve with time and sensitivity to differences between the local communities. The focus is on the action of a twist – turning the boundary into a gate, a threshold and open possibility for a passage, where time and movement are essential. The principal research and design tactics are drawing, spatial drawing and geometrical inquiry. While drawing is the instrument for commoning processes between the students and inhabitants, geometrical inquiry is centered on the notions of a gate, time and movement. The foreseen result is a 1:1 meantime²-gate spatial drawing exposing and triggering the dynamics, criticality and vulnerability of multiple and complex threshold geometries. Image 1 The Gates, Christo and Jeanne-Claude, 2005 Image 2 Aramu Muru (Gate of the Gods), Peru, 2nd century B.C.E Extrapolations! by Marine de Dardel & Lorenza Donati Designing the meantime – to think about the future is to have faith in today: Inspired by thechild’swonderful ability todaydream and wander about, led by it’s subconsious desires, raw emotions and sensorial impulses, Driven by a common fascination for the overwhelming abundanceof information and endlessmultiplicities of perception, contradictions and complexities of sites apprehended through the means of multidisciplinary sources and a referential vocabulary, Urged by the imperatives of contemporary situations, socio-political incentives and both historical scenarios and ficitonal narratives, Supported by contemporary media and technologies, based on open source data and universally accessible tools, We aim at the reporting of hard facts and data as well as the recording of subjective (his)stories, experiences and dreams. The students shall combine systematic research and on-site surveying (such as photographic reportage and recording) with their subjective perceptions to suggest alternate stories thanks to multi-disciplinary sources. The aleatory or strategic ordering of images shall produce shock, tension and poetry, and potentially endless narratives. Past, present, and future becomings of the ring road and all impacted districts of Antwerp will beintertwined, generating unprecedented stories in which actors, places, infrastructure, truth, fiction, promises, memories, wishes all take part. Such a collection of imagery could further be extended throughout the whole process of construction, exponentially de-multiplying the potential outcomes, and most importantly acting both as a recording canvas of the meanwhile as well as the screen ontowhich both adults and children may project their dreams for the future. 1 2 3
18 19 # 1 6 # 1 7 1 Urban legends in the making by Kitti Baracsi What is a place without stories? What if they can help themaking of a not-yet place by experiencing its present in our imagination? The workshop aims at experimenting through the power of imagination together with children of 10-14 years old to create an already present at the construction site through specific urban legends about it. Based on an inquiry into what is the human heritage of Luchtbal, we engage in an exercise of imagination through which we can create the legends of the place. A place yet to be constructed needs a story yet to be written, but the elements are rooted in the surrounding areas’ human heritage, the way people live and narrate their lives. Narrating those lived experiences along with desires, creates the continuum between past, present and future. The workshop builds on Luchtbal’s local knowledge, as well as the exploration of what is/will be happening ‘over the ring’. Through collective mapping, recording of sounds, photos, videos we create the base for the exercise of imagination. We collectively design and construct an installation (both digitally projected and physically constructed) to recreate the imagined legends and create a moment of celebration. Ideally, we can turn this moment into a small carnival, inspiring the subversion by the imagined ‘urban legends’, turning bodies into ‘constructions’ that carry around their ‘yet to be lived’ stories. CIRCULAR STATE OF FREEDOM by Nina Haarsaker, Hanna Landfald Hanssen & Gro Rodne Waiting for something else opens for possibilities to engage, invite, make, form former impossibilities, and if with great success: changing the ongoing process and plans, and continue for decades ahead. The feeling of taking chances, no fear. Being in a design process always challenges us into being in the in-between, the liminal and the uncertain. In this workshop you will be working directly and bold as a group with the simple and what we find “a lot of” of resources and materials. The goal is to rediscover what we find the most valuable in life. What is freedom? What is the strength of the meantime? Anything and the strange can happen. 3 2 1
20 21 3 2 1 3 2 1 # 1 8 # 1 9 AcupunctuRING - treating the fracture by Kristina Careva & Rene Lisac The City Acupuncture method aims at improving city life quality through regeneration of public space. The method has 3 main pillars: small and precise interventions in the urban fabric can significantly improve urban life; interventions should be designed in the interdisciplinary discourse; and with the participation of the interested stakeholders. The upcoming Antwerp regeneration is dramatically changing relations and image of the city, revealing 3 levels of fracture: in space, social relations, and time. Can small City Acupuncture interventions support this process of triple fracture healing? How can a rough and intensive construction process be soothed by precise urban acupuncture? Howcan local children that will grow up together with these processes be successfully involved? The workshop has a sequence of activities intended to obtain fast and precise results in a short period with divergent phase (broad mapping of all relevant facts and ideas) and convergent phase (focusing on key aspects and actual interventions). Students in interdisciplinary groups will be asked to creatively react and design small interventions in public spaces: either in the ring itself, on its border, or close by. The participation of the school children, as the best target audience and critics, is intended in the middle of the workshop and on the final presentation. Various Small Fires by Federico Taverna & Siebrent Willems There is no doubt that the capping of the road will constitute a radical change for the entire city and the adjacent neighbourhoods. However, we believe the city can also be transformed by everyday events: richness can come from the adjustment in scale or context of conventional elements, producing unusual meanings. Therefore, the workshop will pose the question: how can we design the ordinariness of the future? We will reflect on the relation between the small scale of the objects versus the large scale of the ring road, and the influence upon the intermediate neighbourhood scale. We will project a multitude of small-scale interventions in order to affect the meantime of the ring road, focusing on the effect of ephemeral and ordinary aspects of architecture, and their role within the urban scale. We will explore the notions of permanence and change, the notions of the ordinary and intertwining scales, of symbolism and communication. We will explore the potentialities of urban voids through a speedtrip of collective designing, drawing and discussing contemporary issues of design and urbanism. Starting from their observations, students will define which elements can kickstart the process of a transformation of the everyday. Ultimately, the group will engage in the production of a scenography, in which the interventions will constitute a common scenario for the ring road. 1 2 3
22 23 3 2 1 # 2 0 # 2 1 Nomadic Interference by Carmen Van Maercke & Jitse Massant Designing the meantime is understanding the meantime. But the meantime of what exactly? We propose to develop a double perspective in this workshop. One of the Luchtbal neighbourhood which has been subject to changes in the past and today has a fast changing population (Im. 1). A second of the building process of this enormous construction: who is building this infrastructure? What is the new temporal city that arises during construction? In history, these kinds of enormous constructions always left traces, be it the restaurants in Brunelleschi’s Domo di Firenze, the villages near the Transcontinental Railways in America (Im. 2) or the container villages arising in contemporary construction. How can the ecosystem of engineers, technicians, construction workers, etc. collide within this context of a fast changing community and what places of crossover do they establish? How can such a construction site not only be a burden but generate new urban dynamics? Can children learn how to built themselves in this enormous experiment? (im. 3) How does the lack of local amenities in Luchtbal react upon this temporary presence? We intend to research how both nomadic temporalities interfere with and benefit from each other. Image 1 Kesteloot, C., Rapport Mapping Levendigheid in wijken, WB, Ruth Soenen, Kesteloot, 2016, commissioned by the city of Antwerp Image 3 Skrammellegepladser, Notting Hill, 1971, London Turbo Generator by Maarten Lambrechts & Alice Babini We learned two important things during last year’s workshop: 1. there was an energy grid in the 1950s connecting Luchtbal and the Antwerp port; and 2. Lantis, the developer for the capping of the Antwerp ring road, is interested in the idea of an information centre right in the middle of the Luchtbal construction site To combine both, students will be asked to design a platform in between the on-site cement factory, the water basin and the site cabins, so that we can merge an innate human attraction to energy sources (gather around the fire, under the tree, along the river bank) with the activity of the construction site. A turbo generator for Luchtbal’s future socio-energetic network. The result should be a complete transdisciplinary design: an urban vision for the energy grid that also anticipates the proposed Groenendaal park; a structure that accommodates both energy flows and social interaction; integrated furniture enabling activities for young and old; a site specific art installation that symbolizes the socio-energetic symbiosis of the project. The output is an abstract yet highly performativemodel. The energy flows should be visible (ducts, pipes, wires) and generate as much as possible an effect on light, heat, wind, noise. For the technical expertise on the organization of the construction site, we will collaborate with the engineers of Lantis. To define a social program compatible with the infrastructure and logistics of the construction site, we will talk to children from local schools and elderly people from local neighborhood organizations. Image 1 Groundbreaking ceremony and festivities at Luchtbal, 1949 Image 2 Soviet Union festival for young workers at the construction site, 1950s Image 3 Yves Klein and company in front of the Column of Fire at Haus Lange, 1961 3 1 2
24 25 3 2 1 # 2 2 # 2 3 The virtual meantime by Kristof Timmerman & Ine Vanoeveren Over the past 18 months, virtual solutions have been used to recreate physical entities: virtual museum collections, virtual festivals, virtual plays, etc… Most of them are an exact copy of their physical form – a digital twin. These initiatives arose from existing institutions, with existing, physical content and existing real-life communities. What if we turn this approach upside down and start from a virtual concept, while anticipating the physical space created by the capping of the road? Can we create a virtual space and bring a virtual community together, that can be transported or transformed into an unknown, physical environment in 10-15 years from now? How to design a space for a virtual community, while the real-life community will only develop in the near/far future? In what ways can we accommodate virtual concepts for an audience/community of the future? In this workshop we will brainstorm with the students about several virtual designs, solutions and artworks for a physical area that doesn’t exist yet. We will provide them with virtual tools and techniques, inspiration material from digital arts and virtual performances and guide them through the conceptual trajectory of their own metaverse. The goal of this workshop is to develop several virtual, innovating artistic concepts, awaiting the implementation of the real-life environments and formation of a new community. Computer says “YES” by Aleksandra Sviridova, Ann Dooms & Jouke Verlinden Computational power aiding or replacing designers? As the movie “Humans Need not Apply” (2014)1 emanates, both unskilled and skilled jobs can be replaced by automated systems that combine emerging techniques from robotics and artificial intelligence. This can be considered as a threat or an opportunity – in this workshop, we choose for the latter! In Computer says Yes, we will explore the power of contemporary generative neural networks such as Dall-E2. Furthermore, the workshop participants will use emerging augmented fabrication means to manufacture full-scale prototypes (shaper origin/digital knitting). Finally, the results and insights will be showcased in a local exhibition. The application of the workshop is aimed at new furniture for home/school, in such we can engage local schoolchildren and give these high-tech means a more humane perspective. 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU 2 https://openai.com/blog/dall-e/ 3 2 1
Biographies workshop leaders 27 26 #1 Stijn Rybels Stijn Rybels is an architect and urban planner. He is currently assisting in the design studios of the master in urbanism and spatial planning at the faculty of design sciences where he challenges students to think outside of the box when it comes to the use of our infrastructures. He seeks for relationships between mobility and urban development and is currently preparing a PhD on integrated urban mobility systems. Since 2015 he is an active member of the research group for urban development. His research tries to provide insights into the (spatial) factors that influence active mobility. As a convinced cyclist (for all trip purposes) he tries to motivate others to make the modal shift as well. Workshop: (t)Active Routes #2 Oliver Froome-Lewis & Penélope Plaza Oliver Froome-Lewis engages the everyday in Endurance Walking, Mapping and Map-Making in London, he has created ‘propositional’ maps and events for Olympic Legacy in London’s East End, The London Design Museum, and The London Festival of Architecture. His research addresses mapping tactics that draw parallels between design research, experimental fiction and current practices in Fine Art. (See https://oliverfroomelewis.com) Penélope Plaza is an urban artivist, architect and researcher. She is co-founder of CollectiVoX, a small notfor-profit design practice that co-creates interventions in public space as catalyst for positive social change. Penelope’s research intersects petrocultures, public art, interventions in public space and creative practice. (See https://penelope-plaza. carbonmade.com) Workshop: Drivosaur #3 Sabrina Morreale & Lorenzo Perri Lemonot is a duo based in London - co-founded by Sabrina Morreale and Lorenzo Perri - educators and spatial practitioners, they operate between architecture and performative arts, used as devices to detect, celebrate and trigger the spontaneous theatre of everyday life. Currently, Sabrina is teaching in the Foundation Course at the Architectural Association in London and Lorenzo is teaching at the University of the Applied Arts in Vienna. Together, they’re Programme Heads of the AA Visiting School El Alto (Bolivia), they have taught in Cambridge, at the AA Summer School and at INDA in Bangkok. Their academic research focuses on contemporary forms of conviviality – as a trigger for unconventional spatial languages, between geometrical abstraction and material figurativism. Workshop: The confessional booth: renewing spatial contracts of Luchtbal #4 Fabian Tobias Reiner & Sven Högger Fabian Tobias Reiner (*1994) is an Austrian architect and architectural theorist educated at ETH Zurich and the AA London. Work experience he gained with Leth & Gori, Denmark and camponovo baumgartner architekten, Switzerland. He performs as a regular guest critic in theory and history studies at the AA, is a periodic writer for the Architectural Institute Vorarlberg and published the book ‘Architectural Comfort’. Sven Högger (*1992) is a Swiss architect and photographer graduated from ETH Zurich. He has taught subjects ranging from Interior Architecture and Structural Design to Landscape Architecture both at ETH Zurich and HEAD Geneva. Sven has worked with offices in Rotterdam, Zurich and Geneva and is a founding member of the Swiss collective la–clique. Workshop: CITY HIJACK #8 Inés Ballesteros & Michela Dal Brollo In their research, Inés Ballesteros and Michela Dal Brollo create and demonstrate portable equipment as a set of transportable, practical and conceptual devices, which wename Living Equipment. They research howtogenerate temporary spaces that favour moreheterogeneous and diverse forms of urbanism, in contrast toa tendency towards privatisation and control in public space. They arenow focusing on exploring liminal places of the city of Antwerp. During 2020, Michela and Inés conducted theproject titled ‘Stone soup’ with the support of KunstenplatformPLANB, that evolved in their current research project “Living Equipment: Portable spaces” supported by theRoyal Academy of FineArts Antwerpand in collaboration with other institutions like WPZimmer. Michela and Inés are currently part of the organisation of Samenschool and part of the collective atelier Archipel. (Discovermoreon kunstenplatformplan.be and ap-arts.be) Workshop: Living Equipment: Portable Spaces #9 Philippe Buchs & Angélique Kuenzle Philippe Buchs co-founded SUJETS OBJETS/ in 2020. This architectural office confronts systematically the subject of transforming the existing, adopting an approach of urban durability. Its members are actively engaged in teaching and research, activities considered as integral parts of their architectural production. Their identity oscillates between the smoothness of the free plan and the almost cold sincerity of the border. Workshop: LOVERS JUST FOR ONE DAY #10 Alberto Pottenghi & Mariana Sendas Graduated in Architecture from the Milan Polytechnic in 2006, Alberto Pottenghi (Mantua, 1977) also attended the Faculty of Architecture of the QUT (Brisbane, AUS). He has collaborated with YASUI Architects and Engineers (Tokyo, JP) and with Claudio Silvestrin Architects (London, UK). From 2011 until 2018 he collaborated at the Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio (CH), with Valentin Bearth, Eduardo Souto de Moura and, since 2013, with Francis Kéré, leading the Building Reality construction workshop in various sub-Saharan African countries. From 2017 he is research associate at the chair of Architectural Design and Participation, at TUM Munich (DE). In 2019 he was guest lecturer at the Advanced Design Studio: New Tools at YALE (New Haven, USA). Graduated in Architecture from the ESAP – Escola Superior Artistica do Porto in 2006, Mariana Sendas (Porto, 1981) also attended the Milan Polytechnic (IT). She has collaborated with Menos é Mais, Aarquitectos (Porto, PT), Onsitestudio Architects and Peia Assosciati (Milan, IT). From 2011 until 2015 she collaborated at the Milan Polytechnic with Federico Bucci, Vittorio Logheu and Marco Borsotti. From 2012 to 2019 she is collaborator at the Milan Polytechnic at the chair Architectural Design In Historical Context with Eduardo Souto de Moura and João Luís Carrilho da Graça. From 2014 she is collaborator at the Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio (CH), with Walter Angonese (bachelor), Cristina Guedes (master) and Francis Kéré (diploma). From 2018 to 2019 she was lecturer at the Università degli Studi di Ferrara (IT) for the degree course for Product Design. Together, Alberto and Mariana founded MONOatelier, based in Milan and Porto since 2009. They participated as tutors in the international design workshop week ‘COMMONS’ in 2020, organized by Universiteit Antwerpen. Workshop: SOFT URBAN EDGES #5 Alexandra Sonnemans & Caterina Viguera rotative studio is the collaboration between architects Alexandra Sonnemans (Rotterdam) and Caterina Viguera (Zürich). The explorative and experimental working method of rotative studio is characterized by a continuous interplay of design, research and dialogue. The studio combines working on architectural commissions with self-initiated multidisciplinary projects, in which new and critical approaches towards architectural research and design are developed and expressed. rotative studio’s work has been exhibited at a.o. LFA (‘20), Architecture Week Barcelona (‘18) and New Generations Festival (‘20- ’21). They gained academic experience at the RavB (‘20), TU Delft (‘21), IDW Antwerp (‘20,’21) and i2a (‘20,’21). In ‘20, rotative studio was nominated for the ARC20 Young Talent Award. Workshop: Path of Play #6 Willem Coenen & Aline Veelaert Willem Coenen, architect, founded Atelier Scheldeman in 2017: an architecture atelier focussing on sculptural architecture, experimenting from small to large scale. Designing and building are melting together. Every project searches for new relevant collaborations, resulting in collective work. Atelier Aline Veelaert is a furniture atelier which balances between restorations and design from an interest for detail and crafts with a background in architecture and wood restauration. The IDW workshop will be a continuation of a research called karkas where Willem and Aline teamed up to analyse production processes and their cut offs. Workshop: karkas #7 Diego Inglez de Souza & Julien Ineichen Diego Inglez de Souza (São Paulo, 1978) is an architect and urban planner by the Faculty of Architecture and Urbanism of University of São Paulo (2003), PhD in History and Architecture (FAU-USP/Université Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, 2014), Assistant curator of the X International Architecture Bienal of São Paulo (201), teacher of Catholic University of Pernambuco (2014-18) and fellow researcher at School of Architecture of the University of Minho (2019-22), associated with the Fishing Architecture research group. He collaborates with architects, artists and urbanist collectives such as En commun, based in Lausanne, Atelier vivo in Recife and BijaRi in São Paulo. Julien Ineichen (Lausanne, 1978) is an architecturbanist graduated from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology 2007), with a PhD in architecture (2016) from ENSA-Marseille and UFRNBR. He is an independent reflexive practitioner engaged in the topic of collaborative conception of the urban environment (see w-au. net). Active for more than 10 years in BRazil in the re-characterization of the river Capibaribe’s shores in Recife, he is involved in the conception of participatory projects involving citizens in urban prototyping processes. He is co-founder of the Swiss organisation encommun.ch (2017) that supports actors of the city (citizens, associations, authorities, professionals of architecture and urbanism) in the co-production of urban spaces. Workshop: Searching for New Babylon
29 28 #11 Adrien Meuwly, Adrien Comte & Theo de Meyer Adrien Comte and Adrien Meuwly founded COMTE/ MEUWLY which cultivates the ability to be surprised, to be fascinated by unexpected encounters and discoveries. They develop each project as a narrative, based on the reading of a new situation. What they are observing is not the grandiose, the grandiloquent, nor the sublime, but characters, scenes, objects, places: anchor points whose beauty emerges from their scrupulous assembly, from their relationship in the project. Founded in 2017 in Zurich and Geneva, Compte/Meuwly develops and constructs projects at all scales. From a series of open-plan houses to the transformation of several heritage buildings and the construction of pieces of furniture. They are participating in exhibitions and fairs such as the Milano Design Week or the Swiss --Awards, for which they have been nominated in 2019. Theo De Meyer is an architect operating between multiple practices. Among other things, he works as a project architect for jan de vylder inge vinck architects and as an assistant at the ETH University of Zurich. Through collaborations with artist Manor Grunewald and doorzon interieur architecten, he developed his own independent and still expanding field, including scenography as well as furniture and architecture. Together with Doorzon interieur architecten, Theo froms the core of the Stand Van Zaken modular collective, creator of furniture and architecture through collaborations with specialists in various fields. Stand Van Zaken supports the creation Workshop: Performing Devices #12 Anđelka Bnin-Bninski Anđelka Bnin-Bninski is an architect engineer with specializations in theory of arts and media (University of Arts, Belgrade) and architectural philosophy (ENSA Paris-La Villette, Paris). She works as educator, curator and interdisciplinary researcher, affiliated with the University of Belgrade - Faculty of Architecture and associated with laboratory Grephau in Paris. She is recipient of the French Government Scholarship (2013-14). She holds experience as practicing architect, as an author and member of design teams, she has collaborations with the independent artistic scene in Belgrade and is engaged in multiple international transdisciplinary design-driven projects and initiatives. Her PhD thesis (2018) “The role of the architectural drawing in the dynamics of living space partition” is in domains of philosophy and theory of architectural drawing, it is based on drawing practice and architectural analysis in relation to culture and politics. Her current investigations are focused on critical strategies and activist tactics of architectural drawing research in practice. She is representative for the ARENA architectural research network, she is a member of the Advisory Board for the CA2RE+ project and partner for the RAPS project. Workshop: mean-time²-gate #15 Marine de Dardel & Lorenza Donati Lorenza Donati holds a degree in architecture from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, ETH Zurich, after having graduated with her Masterthesis ‘Palace Robert’ at the Studio Tom Emerson. She went on working with 6a architects (London), Ilai (Zürich) and Bruther (Paris), on several architecture competitions and building projects. Until 2018 she held a position as a teaching assistant and research fellow at the ETH Zurich with Prof. Christian Kerez and Arno Brandlhuber. Since 2020 she dedicates herself to the creation of the agency ‘ALIAS’ to develop independent and collaborative projects across the vast spectrum of architecture, research and interdisciplinary collaboration, with a particular focus on architectural narratives. Marine de Dardel studied Architecture at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, ETH Zurich, qualifying in 2015 with Prof. Markus Peter. Her diploma project ‘Herodiade’ was formulated as an hommage to Mallarmé and concluded several years of research on the relation between form and content and the (re-)writing of a poetic architectural langage. She went on working with Meili, Peter (ZH/MUC) and Lütjens Padmanabhan (ZH), both participating in international competitions and the realisation of complex building projects. Since 2017 she is a project architect at Made in (ZH/GVA), notable realisations include the Gleisarena office building in Zurich, for which she developed a cutting edge glas brick façade design dealing with highly challenging geometries. Since 2018 she has taken over a position as a teaching assistant and research fellow at ETH Zurich with the Voluptas chair for Architecture and Design (Prof. Charbonnet/Heiz) alongside her architectural practice. Since 2021 she has undertaken the study of Creative Coding and Computing at the Zürich University of the Arts to extend both her technical and creative skills mastery. Together they work on projects at the crossroads between architecture, research and creative direction, fascinated by the abundance of information and endless multiplicities of perception. Driven by contemporary situations we approach the complexity of sites through the means of multidisciplinary sources and a referential vocabulary. Our latest common project was a Workshop at ENSAP Malaquais in Paris, working with time-based medias and contemporary urban situations. Workshop: Extrapolations! #16 Nina Haarsaker, Hanna Landfald Hanssen & Gro Rodne Gro, Nina and Hanna work at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Faculty of Architecture and Design, the Department of Architecture and Technology, Centre for FORM, TRANSark and MakingIsThinking (see makingisthinking.net). Gro Rødne is an architect and an associate professor at the Faculty of Architecture and Design, NTNU. She has recently become the IAT-department unity leader of the Center for FORM. She graduated in 1993 as an architect from the Faculty of Architecture at NTH, and continued at the Academy of Fine Arts. Gro was one of three founders of Agraff Architects (www.agraff.no), and has been a working partner, chair and member of the board (2001-2016). Gro has been course coordinator for the first year of the Master program in Architecture during six years and has been the initiator and coordinator of the master course Making is Thinking. She is developing the pilot “Making is Thinking” as a part of TRANSark (www.ntnu.edu/transark), including an experimental learning lab. Nina Haarsaker graduated as an architect at NTNU in 2001, after studies in aesthetics – and later architecture studies in Trondheim, Madrid, Delft and Lund. Her last completed construction project was in 2014 (see sunne-hus.net). Since 2013 with a professional focus on creative methods, place and tectonics within the educational environment at the Faculty of Architecture and Design at NTNU, both leading bachelor`s, transdisciplinary workshops and master courses in Making is Thinking. Extensive experience on facilitating research by design by challenging design habits; through hands-on making and performative actions and enabling new insights and reflection on the transforming and important individual and common experiences in life. Hanna Landfald Hanssen graduated as an architect at NTNU in May 2020. She is currently working as a research assistant at the Faculty of Architecture and Design, - mainly involved in the teaching of first year students in architecture, and also in supervision of master’s theses, workshops and book publishing projects. Her fields of interest are creative processes and methods, materials and the crossing and overlap between creative diciplines. How we as architects give form to an idea, how we communicate it, and what kind of language and tools we use to discuss and find architectural quality, are in her eyes engaging and essential questions in the field of architecture – a field that constantly alternates between the abstract and the concrete. Workshop: CIRCULAR STATE OF FREEDOM #17 Kitti Baracsi Kitti Baracsi is an educator, researcher, activist, specialising in critical pedagogy, collaborative and horizontal processes, and Atlantic Fellow for Social and Economic Equity. Since 2006, she has worked on education, community work and research with marginalised communities in Hungary, Italy, Portugal and Spain. Since 2016, she has worked with NGOs and schools mainly on inequalities and urban education. She works on urbanconflicts through collective learning and creative critique with children and young people (periferias dibujadas). She co-founded the TuTela Learning Network, a platform of marginalised activist experiences, where she did a project with Mujeres errantes, Errant Imaginaries: possible utopias which is a collective diary of imagination and inquiry into inspiring feminist practices. She furthermore collaborates in kollektiv orangotango. Workshop: Urban legends in the making #18 Kristina Careva & Rene Lisac Kristina Careva, PhD, MArch and Rene Lisac, PhD, MArch are associated professors at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Zagreb. They are the authors of the City Acupuncture initiative active since 2009, primarily through interdisciplinary and participative workshops. The initiative has inspired several inclusive projects in the region and received significant international recognition of the 20th Salon of Architecture in Novi Sad, in the category of experiment in architecture. Besides integral planning with participative and interdisciplinary approach, Kristina’s field of interests are architecture and children in which she issued two manuals, while Rene’s interest lies in sustainable strategies for urban and remote areas as well as innovative methods for sustainable scenarios. Workshop: AcupunctuRING #19 Federico Taverna & Siebrent Willems Federico Taverna and Siebrent Willems are two young architects from Italy and Belgium respectively. After studying at the University of Udine and at the University of Antwerp, they both graduated from the international master at the KU Leuven Faculty of Architecture in Brussels, within the “Urban projects, Urban cultures” program. During their studies, they took part in the exchange program at the KTH Faculty of Architecture in Stockholm, where they organized a workshop and exhibition at FärgFabriken. Their work has been featured in various publications, and since their studies they collaborated with several offices and organizations. Besides working as architects in Milan and Brussels, they are engaged with writing for architecture magazines and curating art exhibitions. Workshop: Various Small Fires #20 Carmen Van Maercke & Jitse Massant Carmen Van Maercke is an ir. architect and urbanist (Ghent University, KULeuven and IUA Venice). With her graduation work, she received the BWMSTR label in 2015. She also worked for a while at Studio Paola Viganò and was active for 5.5 years at Architecture Workroom Brussels. Since 2020 she has been a partner of Fallow, a young firm for architecture and urbanism. Jitse Massant is an ir. architect and urbanist (Ghent University) and has been working at plusoffice architects as an urban designer where he mainly directs projects with visioning around transition challenges such as production in the city and climate adaption, both at masterplan level and on a more territorial scale. Jitse approaches these urban issues always from the search for an inclusive story. Workshop: Nomadic Interference #21 Maarten Lambrechts & Alice Babini Maarten Lambrechts in an architect and researcher. He has worked at OMA-AMO, URA, 51N4E, and is currently working for the Research & Innovation team at archipelago architects, studying the direct impact of climate on building and people, setting up new forms of experimental engineering, and implementing sustianable design methods in large scale projects. Maarten studied architecture at the University of Antwerp and History & Critical Thinking at the AA School of Architecture. He has been a guest professor for the Fundamental course in the Ineriors Buildings Cities program at the TU Delft and has taught workshops at The Berlage, Aalto University and the University of Antwerp. Alice Babini is an architect active in Belgium and Italy, focused on cultural infrastructures and ecology. Whether it is about large scale public spaces or a private setting, she aims to rediscuss, through design, the future naturalisation and reprogrammation of the built environment. She completed her studies and internships in Venezia (IT), London (UK), Porto (PT), Copenhagen (DK), and lastly graduated in Milano (IT) with Prof. Carles Muro Soler (GSD Harvard). Since 2016 Alice is collaborating with 51N4E (BE). In parallel to her work there, Alice has worked on the Design in Dialogue lab space for Newrope, Freek PErsyn’s chair at ETH (CH) in 2019 and, in 2020, she has started her own practice with Belgian architect Raf Geysen. Workshop: Turbo Generator
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