Learning Objectives
The project builds on the students' experiential knowledge. It promotes awareness, interaction, movement, social cohesion and togetherness and focuses on impromptu or ad hoc interventions in urban in-between spaces. Hacking and transforming realities and objects into desirable futures lies at the core of the project. Themes of urban future, participation, public sphere and health are explored, researched, contextualized and discussed and made accessible using tangible examples from art, architecture, ecology, social science and design. Students learn to develop hands-on architectural models in the 3D and wood workshops and are encouraged to reflect on their ideas informed by object-based prototyping.
Content
The module welcomes students to develop a wide range of compelling objects whose physical and aesthetic presence enables users to interact in ways that evoke ‘movement’ - physically, emotionally, intellectually. Students are asked to explore their interests in the shaping of places and urban spaces 'outdoor and off-campus’. Students work in explorative and methodical ways and examine public spaces either in a target-oriented or open-ended way. For example, they create physical landmarks kids would find inspirational on their way back home from school or develop low-barrier opportunities for the elderly to socialize outdoors. Objects hacks can focus on a specific function (public furniture), encourage exploration (interactive object), social exchange and participation (game) or contemplation (artistic intervention). The student’s hand-build scaled models of urban spaces, carry out interviews, observe, provoke reactions, document and substantiate their ideas in appropriate visualization formats. With the help of cultural probes, they test public reactions to drive and refine their ideas. Regular coaching sessions and group discussions offer students the opportunity to exchange ideas with their peers and tutors. Students sharpen and reflect on their ideas in response to the feedback they receive. Guests from the fields of design and art, psychology, fitness and health, urbanism, policymaking and landscape architecture support the current discourses on urban co-existence, co-creation and participation in social and public spheres.
Course language
English
Lecturers
Christoph Zellweger, Minh Le, Isabella Pasqualini, Aysun Aytac
