Geerard J. van Lerven, Superficial ornaments, 1930. Appeldorn, Netherlands. Source
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HEAT
Spatial surfaces
SPATIAL DESIGN STUDIO 2 and 3 / SEMESTER 1, 2014
CARL DOUGLAS
40ºC / Battambang, Cambodia / The rainy season is due to start in Battambang any day, filling the rice paddies and the river brim-full. In late afternoon each day towering clouds form on the horizon and the sound of thunder rolls over top of the the buzz of motos and hammering. Some days a few heavy drops will fall or the slightest of breezes will pass. The air smells burnt and feels like a kiln. Downstairs on the street a boy is sitting under the shade of a roadside stall with bottles of petrol, sachets of shampoo, dried fruit. Out of his orange plastic ice-chest he’ll sell you a Coke, an Angkor beer, or a coconut. Unaccustomed to the heat, retrieving something cold to drink is about all you can manage. No proper rain today, just enough to moisten the dust. Long after the twilight has come and gone, the heat of the air remains.
This project invites exploration of *heat* as a perceptual experience, as a process of fabrication, and as an environmental condition.
Heat is part of our perceptual world, one of the axes of our sensitivity. As a result it is also part of our memory, and our shared experiences. The gentle warmth of another’s body reassures us; the radiating heat of food cooking in an umu is the centre of a social assemblage; scorching stone under bare feet leaves almost-burns. Heat is transmitted through direct contact, carried through a medium like air, and radiated directly as energy. How could heat be used as an aesthetic or poetic medium?
Few of the things we make don’t involve the application and control of heat. We use it to sterilise, melt, fuse, bond, destroy, bake. We are surrounded by things that have passed through heat: timber is steamed so it can be bent; ceramics are fired and their glazes set in a kiln; the perfect cup of black tea must be steeped at 99ºC; metals are melted so they can be cast; once it’s heated to a viscous glob, glass can be shaped with the breath. How could you experiment with the constructive capacities of heat? What are the limits, irregularities, or transformative moments of such processes?
Heat is also an environmental condition. It drives the turbulent activity of the winds, and the circulating of water through the atmosphere. Organisms have evolved an array of strategies for retaining and getting rid of heat, including reshaping their environments. One of the primary functions of skin is the regulation of heat. In addition humans insulate and ventilate, use combustion and heat pumps, shade and expose themselves. Greenhouses provide heated environments to accelerate the growth of food plants. Electricity can be generated from heat differentials. How might heat be considered as a contextual factor?
You are invited to focus your design attention on spatial surfaces, sites of contact and perception. For example, you might design ceramic tiles, a wall-hanging, a floor covering, a cladding, textile, table-top, glazing, wallpaper, screen. You’ll need to think about what the surface does, and how it works technically, conceptually, symbolically.
Our design inquiry will proceed through trial-and-error making; and employ drawing and redrawing as a means to reinterpret the things we make and find.
READINGS
Fernández-Galiano, L. (2000). /Fire and Memory. On Architecture and Energy/. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Forsyth, I., Lorimer, H., Merriman, P., and Robinson, J. (2013). Guest editorial. what are surfaces? /Environment and Planning A/, 45:1013–1020.
Muller, K. (2012). Relational drawing as agency. negotiating the tangible and intangible of Samoan diaspora social space. /IDEA Journal/, pages 122–139.
Pallasmaa, J. (2005). /The eyes of the skin. Architecture and the senses/. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Academy.
Treadwell, S. (2003). Volcanic matter. the architecture of white island. /Architectural Design/, 73(2):36–42.
This blog was used to collect reference material for a Spatial Design studio in progress at AUT University and is now closed. Thanks to all those involved!