|
PRAXIS 14: Testing
Architects test limits—of structure, of materiality, of form, and of the discipline itself.
In the 1980s a faltering economy propelled a select group of architects to challenge disciplinary boundaries through alternative representational methods as a means to establish a new criticality. Recently, the question of testing has taken on renewed urgency in the discipline, but today's testing happens through different methods, means and ends.
Most directly, testing refers to an extreme or improbable materiality, that is, extraordinary projects realized with experimental materials and processes. However, testing also takes on a more philosophical or conceptual approach. Digital processes enable designers to "test" through multiple scenarios, furthering the tension between “process” and “product,”
This issue will explore the material, structural, conceptual, and intellectual possibilities of “testing” as a new architectural paradigm, and its ramifications at multiple scales.
PRAXIS 14A (Special Issue): The Return to Narrative
Once upon a time, there was once upon a time. It was called Narrative, and,
during the 1976-1986 climax of what was called Postmodernism, it had
something to do with Architecture. It emerged critically through a series of
adjacencies. Venturian pop appropriations; Gravesian classicisms; Hejdukian
masquerades: all had something to do with History. Which had something to
do with Memory. Which had something to do with Narrative. And in the years
that followed, as architectural talkers increasingly spoke the languages of
literary and structural theory, notions of Story and Sequence claimed a
critical afterlife. Flash forward to the very late 00’s and the literary endeavor
that is the journal you hold in your hands now addresses the ruins of this
Spolia, and discerns within them the surprising foundations of today’s design
discourse. Does it all end Happily Ever After? You tell us. What’s your story?
DEADLINE for both: JULY 1
See 'Submit' for Guidelines
|
|
|
