Digital

1. In the Picon reading he states, "computer generated images play a role in this crisis of scale", do you believe this statement holds true in your own work? 
2. In the Picon reading he states that architectural form used to appear as the ultimate result of a process of research, he then continues to say a computer generated architectural form can no longer pretend to achieve this status. Do you believe this statement to be true? Can an architectural form solely begin with a computer generated process?
3. In Allens reading he claims traditional architectural representation has power because of its abstracted approach, do you think that oversimplification or over abstraction can lead to a faulty design?
4. Are there new technological advancements in computer generated design that can help solve the problems discussed in both readings? Do you think virtual reality is the future of architectural design?

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WEEK 13_AVOIDING DIGITAL PITFALLS

1. In the reading Architecture, Science, Technology, and the Virtual Realm, Antoine Picon discusses how architecture operates in the virtual dimension. What are the advantages and disadvantages to this? In the future, do you believe there will be advances in technology that could push us closer to full actualization?

2. "From an architectural standpoint, the major consequence of this preeminence is the destabilization of form, a destabilization all the more paradoxical since it is the operations of the designer and the calculations of the computer that simultaneously and rigorously, define form" (Picon, 303).
Does the use of digital architecture help or hurt our abilities to design form? If you believe it helps, how so? If you believe it hurts, how can we fix this issue while still allowing for digital platforms?

3. In both readings, Allen and Picon discuss the dangers of the destroying the field. How can we use technological advances to help redefine the field and keep it from becoming a "terminal velocity"?

4. "The aim of the architect is no longer to propose an alternative, and allegedly better, world but to take the world as it is, to contribute to the further actualization of its potential rather than bring about the advent of a remote utopia"(Picon, 307).
Do you believe the idea that we are operating in a virtual dimension plays a role on this trend/do you believe advances in technology has brought this about? Do you believe it is more beneficial to operate in the manner of realism? If you believe so, to the architect or the client?

5. Both readings discuss scale through computer-generated images. In what ways do you believe scale is being lost/advanced through digital platforms?

6. Allen mentions that a disadvantage of working through a computer is that everything is accumulative and nothing is lost. Have you ever found this to be a disadvantage in your own work while designing through a digital software vs by hand?

Week 12: Research Methodologies

1 Let’s take a poll and see if there are any overwhelming majorities. How would you classify yourself? (anonymous – write on a piece of scrap paper - pick just one)

Herzog and de Meuron or {{{{Operations}Projects}}}

Aranda\Lasch or {{{{Operations}}}Movement}

Le Corbusier or {{{}Projects}Theses}Movement}

OMA or {{{{}Projects}Theses}}

Bruno Taut or {{{{}Projects}}Movements}

Enric Miralles or {{{{}Projects}}}

Diller + Scofidio or {{{{}}Theses}}

Are the results a product of the faculty/curriculum of this school, or mostly a personal choice?

Is your classification the same as your favorite architects?

2 “Movements are usually defined as organized effort to achieve a common goal” – Pineiro II

What are the current overarching (or most exciting to you) movements of architectural practice? Do we expect these to change in the next five years (or near future?) – Thinking about what we will encounter as we enter the working world.

3 “The process of design and construction is characterized by constant tactical adjustments made to the demands of clients, codes, consultants, budgets, builders, and regulatory agencies, not to mention the complex logistics of construction itself?” – Allen XI

Do any of these types of demands worry you more than the others in studios or as you think about entering practice?

4 “It is precisely when practice and experimentation turn up inconsistencies in the “normal science” that new theories are produced” – Allen XII

Which of the classifications as presented by Pineiro best facilitate the balance of practice and experimentation required to produce new theories?

5 “…doubt returns thought to openness before the world; it involves a loss of control which places thought in a more vulnerable relation to the world than before” – Allen XV

How much does doubt weigh on your thoughts throughout the design process? Is it a tool or an impediment? Is it more prevalent in the beginning (when choosing what the project should be), at the end (when thinking about what the project could have been), or some other time? (I’m thinking of doubt as “hard-headed” skepticism here. Self-criticism, client desires, best approaches, etc…)

week 12_research methodologies

Allen, "Practice vs. Project" Introduction, Practice, pp X-XXIII:

1. "Constraint is not an obstacle to creativity, but an opportunity for invention, provoking the discovery of new techniques." (p. XV)

How does constraint benefit and/or effect our own work in studio and what are some of those constraints that we are faced with?

2. "Meaning is not something added to architecture; it is a much larger, and a slipperier, momentary thing. It is not located in the architecture; it is what happens to and around architecture as part of a complex social exchange. It happens in the interval, as the result of an encounter between architecture and its public, in the field" (p. XIV)

This idea of social infrastructure and interaction creating meaning in architecture is very powerful, developments can create social and architectural impact on a multiplicity of scales. How do we as designers create these scenarios? In the context of Milwaukee, I think of developments such as Fiserv Forum, The Hop, and the Summerfest grounds.

3. "Two important senses of the word practice intersect here: practice designating the collective and peripatetic improvisations of multiple inhabitants in the city connects to practice as the creative exercise of  an intellectual discipline by an individual." (p. XIX)

Where these two senses of practice intersect there is spectrum of intensity between strict and creative. Are there nodes along this spectrum that are more applicable to different aspects of the design process? The above quotes relate to the Lopez-Pineiro reading as it describes a bridge between practice and production in both a professional and academic construct.


Lopez-Pineiro, "How to do a Thesis: Practice Models as Investigators for Academic Theses", pp 1-9:

4. In regard to the categories described within the Lopez-Pineiro reading (p. 3-7):

• Herzog and de Meuron or {{{{Operations}Projects}}}
• Aranda\Lasch or {{{{Operations}}}Movement}
• Le Corbusier or {{{}Projects}Theses}Movement}
• OMA or {{{{}Projects}Theses}}
• Bruno Taut or {{{{}Projects}}Movements}
• Enric Miralles or {{{{}Projects}}}
• Diller + Scofidio or {{{{}}Theses}}

  How would you classify your own design characteristics/process in relation to the above categories?

5. Pre-thesis students: 30-second elevator pitch of your current thesis research (i.e. topic, location, advisory, concept, etc.). What are your personal opinions of the process so far?

6. Even if you are not in thesis, how could these ideas described in the reading be applied to daily studio/seminar work to better evolve projects and create more innovation? 

week 12 - research methodologies

1 allen states "theory's promise is to make up for what practice lacks, to confer unity on the wildly disparate procedures of design and construction." in your experiences interning with or working for an architectural firm, how hove you found practice and theory interact?

2 because visual and material practices have rules that differ from those of textual practices, allen says "...architecture has never been particularly effective as a vehicle of criticism." that it is inherently affirmative and instrumental. as architecture students who receive criticism in regards to our visual and material based architectural projects, do you agree or disagree with this?

3 "...image culture belongs to the new ways of thinking and seeing that have emerged with modernity: shifting mental schemas that mark our uncertain position in the modern would and force us to see how the practice of architecture has been constantly revised by the complex current of twentieth century thought." how are imagerial representation (images, film, graphics, etc) seen as fleeting (or are they not?) and help us better understand ever-changing contemporary architecture?

4 lopez-pineiro wonders of traditional thesis rituals in schools of architecture "why do we-the architectural community at large-ask students to do a thesis if most practicing architects do not work in this manner?" as a first year grad, i also wonder. for those of you currently in thesis, are you 'enjoying' the process so far/would you prefer another way of structuring thesis? if so what would that look like for you?

colllage

1. Shields writes “a work of architecture contains accumulated history as it is lived and engaged rather than observed.” How as students are we able to convey a sense of history or engagement with a studio project? How can collaging aid this process?

2. Through your own projects what has collaging been most effective at conveying? Was this information easily comprehended by the audience?

3. On page 163 Corner states he is “struck by the range of types and forms of representation in comparison to the relatively small number of techniques used in the landscape, architectural, and planning arts.” Do you think this limit in representation is due to the field of our study?

Week 11

1.  “collage has transformed throughout the past century as the conception of space has evolved Materially, the choice of fragments is also distinctive, revealing evidence of the time and place in which the collages were constructed” (Shields : 9) Since collage has gone through evolutionary changes, in what ways does that effect how people think about collage and how it has an effect on the design of architecture. 
2. “The collagist’s tools are simple: a scalpel used in tandem with a probe or a pair of tweezers and small tabs to keep things in the right place prior to the gluing operation.” (Nicholson: 20) How has technology changed or replaced the tools necessary to create collage? 
3. “Any recovery of landscape in contemporary culture is ultimately dependent on the development of new images and techniques of conceptualization.” (Corner: 153-154) Before the contemporary culture, 1945 to the present, how would collage helped the recovery of landscape issues?... like the Great Depression, 1929-1939, or WW2, 1939-1945.  

WEEK 11_COLLAGE

1. On page 22 Nicholson states, "Making requires living with something that is knowingly incorrect. It is this anti-idealistic incorrectness which mysteriously permits the work to advance." This reading also suggests that the act of collage making is as productive as the outcome. Have you used collage as a generative tool during the architectural design process?
2. On page 2 Shields states, "The practice of collage has the capacity to capture spatial and material characteristics of the built environment, acting as an analytical and interpretive mechanism." Can the rendering software that we are taught in school, such as v-ray, capture the spatial and experiential qualities that collage is capable of achieving? What are the shortcomings of v-ray/lumion/ sketchup in comparison to collage and vice versa?
3. How can digital tools successfully be used in conjunction with collage, so that the full potential of collage as suggested by the readings is not lost? Are there any examples that come to mind?

WEEK 11_COLLAGE

1. Throughout all three readings by Nicholson, Shields, and Corner, each brief on the the process of collage making. The readings discuss the advantages of collages as a physical process, but are there any advantages to using digital production in the collage making process? If so, what do you think they are? If not, what advantages could our architectural representations benefit from by using collage outside of the digital platforms?

2. "The practitioner must have the skill to free the weight of the body, so that it can pirouette about the scalpel blade whist constant direction and pressure is applied to its point" (Nicholson, 20). In this quote from the reading, Collage Making, Nicholson discusses that one must understand the collage making process but also allow the mind to free itself during the process. Do you believe the most successful collage is one that is preplanned or on the spot? How do you create an architectural representation to convey a certain layers of meaning if it is not preplanned?

3. Do you use collage in your architectural representation to reveal layers of understanding to yourself or others?

4. Within the reading by James Corner, he discusses landscape and image being inseparable. Do you think landscape in collages heightens or hurts the image? If applied to an architectural representation such as a rendering, do you think it should display "realistic" landscape types or something as imaginative as a collage?

5. In the readings from Shields and Nicholson, both discuss collage being a tool to allow for layering of information. In this collaged image by Henry Stephens, what are the different layers of information he is trying to portray? Which are the most important?