I'm officially done with Sci-Arc

I got a haircut in the morning before review. I wanted to look fresh and feel good.  I was little tired from staying up late the previous night.  It was hard not to help others finish.  I spent the last several years helping out others, and even though it was my year, I still had the urge to help.  At any rate, I was slated to present 4th, but got moved up a spot.  I found out from a phone call, while i was at the other end of the building.  Unfortunatly, I wasn’t ready, my powerpoint was being processed and my laptop was chugging along really slowly.  So, instead of transfering to a usb stick, i ran with my laptop to my presenation area.

Presentation, check.

Laptop and Projector, check.

Showtime, check.

I don’t remember too much, just that I had a good time, was entertaining and able to engage the crowd.  In terms of the project, the main conversation was over, the difference between a framework and a model.

I’m glad it’s all over.  I could have done more, but I was proud of my work.  I’m glad that’s becoming a trend.

Time to sleep, and get a hair cut tomorrow.

I’m also glad that Yasameen and Rahi are going to come in and help with the table, and other miscellaneous task.  I’ve also got assistance from Christina on the laser cutting.  It’s nice getting help.

I’m being cryptic, but I think I am clear, at least to those that are capable of understanding.  There are always things that get swept under the rug.  Whether they are things that you didn’t realize matter, or even if you did, something else became more attractive.  Along the way, you manage to lie to yourself and even though it hurts, you continue because you don’t know what to do.  It’s an entirely lonely position, that even your own rational mind disappears.  Paralyze body, and a mind that won’t slow down, all you need is something to crash into.  It’s a scary proposition, because you have to trust in your own ability to put yourself back together again, and if you can’t, then you have to trust that someone will be there when you can’t.  And as bad as all this sounds, you feel like you’ve been given a bad hand in life, or you’ve lost a really great hand, either way, working out of a percieved hole, just plain sucks when the world is pushing down.

MDH was also kind of enough to photograph the table for me as well.

They jurors were kind, because they had seen the project before, and Marcus wanted to push me towards articulating my thesis, and what my stance was.  Next time, I can not hesistate.

Besides the learning experience, it was good to know that I had the support of my friends/colleagues.  Bjork came in to visit, and we had a good conversation about the work.  And a few other came by to off there help.  Thesis at sci_Arc can be a singular process, but I think it is important to find as many avenues of collaboration.  It should be a fundamental design requisite.

Tonight was just one of those night where, I drop one down.

The City from Baoquoc Doan on Vimeo.

So let’s begin.

What have I created?

The pencil, mouse and keyboard are prosthesis.  Extensions that allow, the handler to engage various realms of representations and realities.  The table I have created is a prosthesis for the user to engage and access a unique digitally constructed world.

This world, is a realm where individual ‘units’, in aggregation create 3D geometry.  Each unit has its own set of capabilities, and inherent dispositions. They have an intelligence, and behavioral logic that makes them cognizant of it’s environment and proximity.

To engage these individual(s), a table is crafted with a mechanism, that allows a person to alter and introduce behaviors. The idea is to allow a person to playout/introduce combination of behaviors, thereby influencing the digital world’s method of self-fabrication.  This table, in essence, provides an ominous perspective into the production of a world.

Where is the Architecture?

If architecture is driven by technique.  Then technique enables possibilities for realization.  By transferring the responsibility over to the ‘units’ to craft geometry, based on the conditions of the environment, the ‘new’ technique, is about controlling the ecology of techniques.  The architecture is no longer about solving geometrical problems, or or any post rationalization of complex form for construction, because that responsibility is transferred over to capable intelligent processes.  Instead the greater architectural question is how will we manage these processes towards our own preferences, and inherent inefficiencies.

In an overal sense, this table becomes a control deck for the management of techniques.  Though the result is the dynamic production and rationalization of geometry, it is ultimately the management of techniques that determines which of the infinite possibilities becomes palatable to our collective whims.

Why am I interested in this?

Good Question…