Lecture: Kate Yeh Chiu and Jia Yi Gu, "Material Acts: Experimentation in Architecture and Design"
Thursday, March 20, 5:30pm
1100 A + DS
Join us for a presentation by Kate Yeh Chiu and Jia Yi Gu, curators and co-editors of the e-flux Architecture project Material Acts, to discuss their most recent publication and exhibition, “Material Acts: Experimentation in Architecture and Design.”
Material Acts accompanies and shares its name with the exhibition at Craft Contemporary in Los Angeles in 2024, offering a companion that delves into the research shown in the galleries. The publication is organized around the same five thematic material acts of the exhibition: “Animating,” Disassembling,” “Feeding,” ‘Re-fusing”, and “Stitching.” Formats employed include commissioned essays, photography, how-to guides, and conversations spanning the scope of the project.
Together, these projects examine the role of nature as a starting point for material experimentation in the domains of architecture, craft, and science. While nature has often stood in as a model, metaphor, or resource for designers, the recent global upheavals in climate, ecology, and technology are driving intensive understandings of nature’s tangible and imagined substrate. These projects look at how contemporary design practices mobilize, confound, and generate natures, whether through simulating mechanics or growing biological matter.
The lecture will be followed by a conversation with Associate Director, Undergraduate Affairs and Assistant Professor Antonio Torres.
This event is organized in collaboration with MAS Context.