Lecturers

Dr. Roman Kirschner
, Florian Brugisser, Kaspar König

Guest

Theun Karelse

Timeframe

The module takes place over 6 weeks, from 17.03.20 to 24.04.20, from Tuesday to Friday, 9.30-17.00 - see timetable below for detailed hours and classrooms. Class sessions include lectures, discussions, mentoring sessions, in-class exercises, assignments and independent study blocks. Projects are conducted individually or in a team of three students at most.

Room

ZT 4.K16. (on some few days: 5.K07). Additionally, we have a reservation of Modellbau Projekte ZT 2.E20-UU.

Overview and Objectives

The module 'Spatial Interaction' challenges students to deepen their practical and conceptual knowledge of human interactions in their immediate surroundings. Starting from a location in Zurich where public life and „tamed nature“ overlap, they will develop spatio-technical frameworks for situated interactions. The student projects will connect people and environmental processes with the aim of investigating local impacts of urban (or everyday?) behavior as well as long-distance effects of individual actions. They will learn how to interface the present mesocosm (collecting environmental data, identifying relationships) and how to experiment with advanced techniques like remote sensing or machine vision. Designing in such situations requires the development of strategies for public outreach and communication as well as basic knowledge about intervening in complex systems. In addition, students learn how to connect spatial and conceptual complexities and structure their approach in relation to their project goals while iteratively adapting their methods. Students will work in groups and in a form of self-governed organization developed specifically for this course.

Schedule

Phase 0: Kick-off, Inputs, Workshop Th. Karelse

Phase 1: Research, Idea Finding, First-tests, Group Building

Phase 2: Prototyping, Construction, Real-World-Application/Interventions, Iterations for Improvement

Phase 3: Preparation of the final presentation/Exhibition

Phase 4: Feedback, Analysis, Documentation

Kick-Off

• Presentation of the topic
• Explanation of the structure of the course (how are practical, conceptual and technical layers interwoven?)
• Examples
• Discussion of the challenges ahead

Conceptual Inputs

1. Introduction
   1. Approaches: Networks/Flows vs. Metabolism
   2. „Outerview Effect“
   3. Space of everything? Relational and multiple spaces!
   4. Metabolic Entanglements
   5. Social space and its formation
   6. Navigating complexity and its implication
2. Biosphere 2 and its meshwork of diverse performances
   1. Example of explorative, spatial research in complex environment
   2. Relationship Ecosystem-Technology
   3. "Innerview Effect"
   4. Relationship Projection-Performance
   5. Learning from experience in total immersion

Technological Inputs

1. Image & Video Processing (Blob Tracking)
2. Computer Vision (Open CV & Open Pose)
3. Communication Protocols (OSC, MIDI, MQTT)
4. Sensor Networks (Data Aggregation)

Exercises

1. Extended Conceptual Speed-Dating (Flusser vs. Massey)
2. Spatial Analysis (Taking Perec on a tour)
3. Space-Intervention-Matrix

Mentoring

We will prepare doodles for the indicated mentoring days with time slots of different length depending on the progress of the overall project. Reserve your slot and try to be on time. Questions can be asked anytime – also via email. Attention: One block of mentoring (March 12-13)  is mandatory! On these two days each group or individual has to come to at least one mentoring session.

Presentations

• First Concept (everybody)
• Second Stage (informal and optional – some approaches might not be presentable at this time. But if you want your project to be discussed by the whole group, present it here! Otherwise come to the mandatory mentoring the same afternoon or the following day.)
• Final (this really counts!)

Literature

• Baccini, Peter, et. al.(2012) Metabolism of the Anthroposphere: Analysis, Evaluation, Design, MIT Press
• Bourdieu, Pierre (1989) Sozialer Raum, symbolischer Raum. In: Dünne J., Raumtheorie - Grundlagentexte aus Philosophie und Kulturwissenschaften, Suhrkamp 2006, 354-368
• Flusser, Vilém (1991) Räume. In: Dünne 2006, 274-258
• González de Molina, Manuel, et al. (2014) The Social Metabolism: A Socio-Ecological Theory of Historical Change, Springer
• Massey, Doreen (2009) Concepts of space and power in theory and in political practice, Documents d'anàlisi geogràfica 55, 15-26
• Mol, Arthur P. J., et al. (2018) Zur Umweltsoziologie der Netzwerke und Flows. In: Groß M. (ed) Handbuch Umweltsoziologie. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 140–153
• Nelson, Mark (2018) Pushing our limits: Insights from Biosphere 2, University of Arizona Press
• Perec, Georges (1997) Species of Spaces, Penguin
• Reider, Rebecca (2009) Dreaming of the Biosphere: the theater of all possibilities, University of New Mexico Press
• Weinstock, Mark (2013) System City: Infrastructure and the Space of Flows, Architectural Design 224
• Whyte, William H. (1980) The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces, Project for Public Spaces
• Zabel, Bernd, et al. (1999) Construction and engineering of a created environment: Overview of the Biosphere 2 closed system, Ecological Engineering 13, 43–63