Archinect - News

Two New York design studios provoke post-pandemic connections with their new installation in Long Island City

2021-11-29T18:26:00-05:00

As New York City continues to emerge from the dark days of the pandemic that sent it reeling well into the early spring of this year, a new effort has been put forth led by local artists and design studios to help the city’s eight million residents reconnect via a series of public installations spread throughout the five boroughs.

Image © Savannah Lauren

The latest in this series will help turn a usually overlooked park in the Queens neighborhood of Long Island City into an eye-catching space for community engagement thanks to a temporary installation from Hive Public Spaces and The Urban Conga.

Image © Savannah Lauren

Activated by the park’s mostly unwitting users, Ribbon attempts to intervene in their day-to-day pedestrian activity, offering play as an intervention through a network of malleable magenta “units” made of mirrored boxes which reveal the surrounding built environment while at the same time serving as guideposts that challenge the way in which space itself is perceived....

Es Devlin's UK pavilion is unveiled as the Expo 2020 Dubai officially kicks off

2021-09-30T12:26:00-04:00

Lauded as one of the “must-see” highlights at this year’s Expo 2020 Dubai, the entry from the United Kingdom stands above the crowd thanks to a unique collaborative design from London-based artist and designer Es Devlin.

Photo © Alin Constantin Photography

The 20-meter (65.5-foot) conical CLT structure will host a program that highlights advancements in artificial intelligence, sustainable food, fashion, and other technologies relating to the Expo’s theme of “Connecting Minds, Creating the Future.” The pavilion also includes an interactive feature, inspired by Stephen Hawking, that will transcribe and then broadcast user-aggregated messages into space using machine learning technology.

Photo © Alin Constantin Photography

Devlin, who, in the past, has collaborated with luminaries like Bjarke Ingels and Benedict Cumberbatch, and who was responsible for the 2012 London Olympics closing ceremony Union Jack set design, came to view the pavilion as a showcase for not only technology and com...

Art of Intervention: One-to-One #34 with architect Abraham Burickson, founder of the immersive theater company, Odyssey Works

2016-08-16T17:06:00-04:00

In the spring of 2015, we ran a Working Out of the Box feature with Abraham Burickson, the practicing architect who founded Odyssey Works—a theater company that produces performances for an audience of one, often lasting days. Participants are extensively researched and the performances are rigorously planned, so that the whole thing unfolds before them spontaneously, as they move about the world.

To Burickson, theater and architecture are one and the same—their objective is to immerse the audience, and make them feel something. And in preparation for this month’s theme of Games, it's impossible not to see Odyssey Works' performances in the same genre of experience: game-like interventions that change the way we experience the built environment.

The following interview is our conversation from February of 2015, edited for time and clarity.

Listen to One-to-One #34 with Abraham Burickson:

iTunes: Click here to listen and subscribe to the new "Archinect Sessions One-to-One" podcast
SoundCl...

BART and LA Metro battle via Twitter haikus

2016-06-29T18:26:00-04:00

Oh, SF BART Twitter account—back at it again with the going rogue. This time, instead of getting real with folks on the platform, they decided to have a little fun with the Los Angeles Metro account, challenging them to a full-on haiku battle on Twitter this past Friday.

The official Twitter account for the BART isn't sycophantic or pandering: when confronted with customer concerns, it answers them with actual facts, even if those facts wouldn't gel with a traditional PR department. Now, however, the BART account has gone one step further and is outright having fun, challenging the LA Metro and New York's MTA to a haiku battle.

While it's safe to say that both the BART and the LA Metro should keep their day jobs, having a playfully-minded transit system is not necessarily a bad thing.

When not writing haikus, here's what else public transit is up to:

Does Houston's architecture lack poetry?

2016-02-04T18:23:00-05:00

Houston's architects obviously do not read poetry. None of the corporate buildings, apartments and hotels being built now seems like something we'll be proud of 20 years from now. Of course, that's assuming that those buildings even survive 20 years in a city that is characterized by destroying its architectural past. [...] But maybe we citizens can influence the builders. We can tell them how ugly their buildings are. We can refuse to rent space in them.

Hunts Point | Memories of the Future

2014-08-27T14:51:00-04:00

In collaboration with fifteen poets and community activists from StartUp Box South Bronx, I recently created Memories of the Future, a location-based cinema project viewed on mobile phones. The group experimented with spoken word poetry, site specific performance, and on-site spectatorship to reframe the predominant view of Hunts Point and speak about possibilities for its future from a position of power.

“The Space of Poetry” exhibition in Boston examines the built environment of poetry

2014-04-22T13:25:00-04:00

Who knew that architecture could let you perceive poetry in a new angle or two. Currently at Boston Architectural College's 951 Boylston Street Building until May 1, "The Space of Poetry" exhibition reveals the intricate ties between the written art form and architectural history, theory, and design — all by Cara Armstrong, a trained architect and poet who works as an educator, writer, and illustrator.

As an exhibition extra, the gallery is inviting everyone to a free talk on April 30 at 5 p.m. We can be sure this won't be like your typical poetry analysis class.

"The exhibition delves into the space of poetry by bringing it together with architecture history, theory and design, encouraging viewers to look critically at poetic construction and promoting a more evocative understanding of architecture and writing...

Using the lens of architecture and art, [Armstrong] visually considers story, structure, music, and imagination as building blocks. Then, through architectural analysis techniques such as solid/void analysis and diagramming, she translates individual poems into a set of spatial relationships that becomes art in its own right. This allows the work of poets such as John Donne, Jean Valentine, and Jane Mead to converse across time and brings to light similarities in form, structure, and meaning."

Find more details on Bustler.