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SPECULATIVE ARCHITECTURE LABORATORY

The Speculative Architecture Laboratory is a research cluster within the RMIT Design Research Institute - Future Fabric of Cities initiated by RMIT Architecture Associate Professors Vivian Mitsogianni, Paul Minifie and Pia Ednie-Brown. The aim of this laboratory is to support and foster design research that emphasises speculative, experimental approaches to analysing and producing environments.

supported by:
Future Fabric of Cities
a Flagship program within:
RMIT Design Research Institute (DRI)

EVENTS AND PROJECTS

RMIT ARCHITECTURE SYMPOSIUM
SPECULATIVE FORMATION

The RMIT School of Architecture and Design and the Design Research Institute invite you to a symposium titled "SPECULATIVE FORMATION: complex systems and non-linear design strategies".

Venue: RMIT, Building 8, 368 Swanston Street, Level 11, Room 68
Time: Friday 09 March 2012, 06:00 PM to 09:00 PM
Free admission

The symposium will explore the role of computation within highly speculative approaches to architectural design. The discussion will address the volatile nature of complex systems and their indeterminacy in opposition to the role of computational design in exercising hierarchical control. The symposium brings together international and local architects and critics who are exploring complex systems of formation.

Event Supported by:
DRI Future Fabric of Cities - Speculative Architecture Laboratory

Presentations and panel discussions will include:
Andrew Benjamin, Francois Roche, Camille Lacadee, Ezio Blasetti, Anthony Burke, Dave Pigram, Vivian Mitsogianni, Paul Minifie, Pia Ednie-Brown, Tim Schork, Tom Kovac, and Roland Snooks.

RMIT ARCHITECTURE PUBLIC LECTURE
"Volatile Formation"
Roland Snooks, Practice: Kokkugia

Venue: RMIT Building 8, Level 11, Room 68 (Lecture Theatre) Swanston Street, Melbourne
Times: 06:00 PM to 08:00 PM
Contact: Vivian Mitsogianni
61 3 9925 3510

Event Supported by:
DRI Future Fabric of Cities - Speculative Architecture Laboratory

The emergence of complexity theory over the last four decades has radically altered our understanding of formation and the volatility of their processes. The conceptualisation of form has shifted from the macro scale to a concern for the operation of the complex systems that underlie formation. Kokkugia's experimentation with these non-linear systems as architectural design strategies has lead to a series of open-ended research trajectories that generate their own specific set of problems and internal conflicts.

These methodologies have emerged from an understanding of swarm intelligence and operate through the self-organisation of multi-agent systems. Design intent operates within these methodologies through the interaction of local behaviours rather than the explicit description or parametric manipulation of form and organisation.

Behavioural design methodologies represent a shift from ‘form being imposed upon matter’ to ‘form emerging from the interaction of localised entities within a complex system’. Designing through non-linear behavioural systems challenges the hierarchies that are embedded within architecture, and has radical implications for the generation of tectonics and their attendant affects.

Speaker Bio:
Roland Snooks is a director of the architecture practice Kokkugia, a lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania where he is a Senior Researcher at the Nonlinear Systems Organisation (NSO), and the George Isaacs Distinguished Fellow at USC. Roland is also an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Columbia University and the Pratt Institute and has previously directed design studios and seminars at SCI-Arc, UCLA, RMIT University and Victorian College of the Arts. Roland's current design research is focused on emergent design processes involving agent-based techniques. Roland holds a B.Arch from RMIT University and a Master of Science in Advanced Architectural Design from Columbia University where he studied on a Fulbright scholarship. He was named the Australian Curator for the 2008 and 2010 Beijing Biennials.

Roland's work with Kokkugia has been published widely including recent articles in: AD, 306090, Domus, L'Arca, World Architecture, Urban Environment Design, Urban Flux, Parametric Prototypes and Contemporary Digital Architecture. Kokkugia's work has been exhibited internationally at venues in: London, New York, Paris, Melbourne, Moscow, Kiev, Turin, Philadelphia, San Francisco Shanghai, Xian and Beijing. Kokkugia were nominated for the Chernikhov Prize in 2006 and 2010. The practice is currently working on projects in the US, China, UK and Mexico.