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Photo: Phil Yeomans/BNPS

The following is from the Bioworks institute website:

“Positioned at the confluence of art and science, we are a tightly knit
group of designers, artists and scientists who seek to develop new
forms of biological products and designs using biotechnology. The
skills and ideas each of us bring to this project will, we predict,
synergize to produce a radical new architectural craft.

The time has finally arrived when the costs of biotechnology have
diminished to make it financially practical for these tools to be
applied by small groups of skilled and motivated individuals. In
essence, our endeavor harkens back to an earlier era of small craft
workshops, albeit utilizing state-of-the-art techniques and resources.

Ever since the advent of novel forms of genetically engineered
micro-organisms containing human and other genes, originally utilized
as “protein-factories” if you will, coupled with the established
technologies of tissue culturing, we seek to develop not just new
organisms, synthetic ecosystems as well.”

This project reminds me of my final year studio project which was a fusion of some research into genetics, xrays of my own body, maya, and rather a few 4b pencils. I have posted the concept text/story and images below:

P  O  S  T  P  R  O  D  U  C  T  I  O  N:__

The year is 2050 and an emergent architecture known as P o s t p r o d u c t i o n has evolved where buildings are recognised not as singular fixed bodies, but as complex energy and material systems that have life spans and co-exist in harmony.  The production of buildings as we once knew ceased long ago.  Pre-fabrication of components and parts, manufactured and assembled in multiple configurations has ended.  Dwindling natural resources, a lack of skilled labour, and unstable climatic environments forced the professions to search beyond traditional modes of design and construction.  As the morphogenetic behaviour of existing materials became known, studies in their self-organisation and potential complexity proliferated.  These led to methodologies for the development of new materials that allowed variation and heterogeneity to emerge, something that until the early twenty first century was avoided at all costs, when variations within materials were seen as imperfections.

Architecture once lagged behind other research professions, the sciences, manufacturing industries, and the mass media’s.  Now architecture leads the profession with the application and use of emergent technologies.  ‘Wet’ nanotechnology utilises the replication potential of biological cell division and DNA as its machinery, as opposed to ‘dry’ nanotechnology which focuses on the creation of minute traditional mechanical devices that allow the manipulation of matter, atom by atom.  The application of ‘wet’ nanotechnology has opened the door for an architecture that is capable of reacting to its environment, both natural and artificial.  The theory of ‘worlding’ as described by Heidegger has been actualised to its extreme possibilities.  Not only do objects transform and mutate depending on the requirements of their users, but buildings are capable of phenotypic reactions, they evolve according to their use.  No longer are there neutral spaces.  Modernist ideals for the simplification of architectural materials and aesthetics has been reversed.  Complexity and variation in architectural form and programme is uncontrolled.

Genetics proved a key field of research in the emergence of P o s t p r o d u c t i o n.  No longer is genetics used solely for the homogenisation of genetic materials, as in agriculture and biological sciences.  Before architecture adopted the possibilities unleashed by genetic research, biologists and medical scientists mapped the human genome (predominately through the work of The Human Genome Project) and developed technologies that enabled manipulation of the human genome. The human body has become a programmable surface capable of reactions to its environment, controlled by the individual.  Once genetic manipulation techniques had been refined it was possible to use this technology to cure all known diseases and deformities within biological life. But this is an ongoing process, as new diseases and abnormalities are evolving at a rate comparable to that of the methodologies used to counter them.  For architecture the possibilities unleashed by this research were unparalleled.

The design of structures has shifted its focus from the preconception that all materials must be isotropic, that is identical properties in all directions, to one that utilises the potential of materials that contain heterogeneous elements.  The evolution of new materials that are ‘grown’ resulted from these technologies.  ‘Machinic Phylum’ once a term used by philosophers to describe the capabilities of matter, being constantly in movement, in flux, and in constant variation is a commonly used term.

The remnants of buildings remaining from the manufacturing era are encased in the new architecture, parasitic in their appearance new structures enclose and provide new amenity to any buildings that are capable of transformation.  As the existing buildings diminish and disintegrate, they are absorbed by the new buildings and recycled to provide material for the growth of the new structures.

A systemic approach to structural systems has developed where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, meaning change and adaptation within localised areas of building systems are absorbed by the structure as a whole. Spatial fluctuations coexisting with virtual and physical environments, brought about by the fragmentation and spatial compaction of society, are now possible and the “fluid, dynamic world” predicted by Neil Spiller in the later part of the 20th century, has become a reality.

Ross Langdon © 2004

images:

Along with the text are a series of intricate drawings, maps and diagrams that illustrate architectural proposals and conceptual projects based Foucault’s  writings on power, knowledge, surveillance, territories and societies of control. The book is  beautifully presented and illustrated. A wonderful reference and source for inspiration, especially working on the seafront projects i seem to find myself drawn to. The quote below leads on from a discussion on Deleuze’s fascination with islands and a text on Michael Tournier’s novel Friday. You can download a pdf version of the full publication here.

“In the Archipelago, the islands don’t define the milieu but the space in between: the routes, the streams, the currents and counter currents, whirlpools and calms. This is the space of countless lines of lights intersecting, converging, creating temporary assemblages. This is the multitude.

We are not islands, but the surrounding ocean. Islands are homogenic, stratified and sedimented, the sea heterogenic, smooth and in constant change. The islands are chartered, but the ocean is only modelled or approached according to the law of averages or pattern recognition.

Sometimes people take refuge on islands. Or at least direct their hopes towards them, the reason is simple: all systems (of belief) require a fixed basis – islands represent that which is ideal and permanent. Islands have edges. They are refuges for those who need something to cling to. Most of the time, though, there are monsters on the islands. That’s why Ulysses and his men had to get away., The single eye had to be closed for good. Where did Ulysses and his men hide? Among the sheep: the cattle, the obedient, the stupid. And, relieved, took to the seas again – to get back home.”

Source: Foucault’s Sleep, Models for a Proposal,
Iconoclast publications 8, Turku 2005, p.70