Coordinator: Miranda Nieboer
At the core of this research by design studio lies Antarctica as one of the most extreme environments on Earth, with its ever changing icescape and its dynamic environmental forces. The overarching questions which the studio will address are:
- How can the Antarctic material conditions and environmental forces reinform our understanding of site specific design?
- How can Antarctica help us in rethinking architectural conventions when we listen to the continent and take its material and climatic conditions into account?
- What alternative architectures can be developed when attending to Antarctica and embracing the notions of change, unpredictability, urgency and contingency?
In other words the students are encouraged to think and shape spatial proposals that embrace and care for a glacial thinking. Instead of a passive white empty screen or canvas, Antarctica acts here in this studio as a critical and dynamic environment for alternative architectures.
Photograph: Miranda Nieboer