Experiments in Motion is a research initiative conducted by the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation in partnership with Audi of America to develop and test new paradigms in the relationship between motion, mobility and design. The program will draw from global thought leaders from around the university, architecture and design professionals, and an expanded network of urban mobility experts from New York City and Audi. Part of the Audi Urban Future Initiative, the program is curated by Therrien Barley.
Artists and architects have long studied the effects color have on human perception. Cool colors tend to appear farther away or ‘recede’ which make spaces feel larger or longer. Warm colors appear closer or ‘advance’ which make spaces feel smaller or shorter. The projects above, by Softlab and Olafur Eliasson, are interesting examples of this phenomena. Cool colors precede warm colors which foreshortens the space and alters the viewers procession and spacial understanding of the respective corridors. Although movement is not physically affected, the viewers comprehension of time is compressed as they move through the space.
Julius Von Bismarck’s Top Shot Helmet Part surveillance camera, part satellite, this apparatus takes video of the subject from above. The helmet documents the artist as he travels by foot, calling to mind the tracking of a suspect by helicopter or a birds eye view only found in cinema. The helmet blocks his vision forcing him move in an erratic and slow pace, while the viewers around also have to change they’re trajectories. And it’s all caught on tape.
In the catalogue for the Cindy Sherman exhibition currently (Spring 2012) on view at the Museum of Modern Art, curator Eva Respini sees in some of the artists earliest work from the 1970s a direct link to the history of motion experimentation. Respini claims that Sherman’s first use of digital techniques in 2007 “recall her college experiments with cutouts of multiple figures, such as Doll Clothes, [below] the 1975 stop-motion animated film, and the 1976 collages Untitled #488 and #489 [above], which evoke the early experiments in motion photography by Etienne-Jules Marey and Eadweard Muybridge. Where these early works chart the movements and gestures of a character that is replicated and multipled, the multiple figures in Untitled #425 [clowns, above] interact with one another to create a tableau; they also allow for a variation in scale that leads to a nightmarish effect in which clowns seem to encroach on the viewer’s physical space.”
If you have a chance to see the show, do so. Sherman has been taking pictures with herself as the model since the early 1970s, traipsing through numerous themes and forms of critique of societal segments. The MoMA show is beautifully composed, and the scale of Sherman’s work (big!) demands a personal encounter, particularly the last gallery space showing the tragic socialites, including the image above, wherein the digitized background gives an effect similar to the stereographic animated gifs we love so much!
Our studio will invert the question of urban mobility, asking not how individuals can most efficiently navigate the static map of the built metropolis, but how the city's various systems and services, from policing to entertainment, can instead come to them. Through a series of case studies, site visits, and design challenges, we will explore the city of mobile services, from the familiar—ice cream trucks, food carts, bike messengers, and tow trucks—to the often radically unexpected, such as California's RV pot dispensaries or mobile lethal-injection facilities in China.
The American city is resurgent after decades of wallowing in the shadow of its suburban neighbors. Increased density means forgotten corners of the city are ripe for architectural speculation. These spaces need more than a renovation - they need to be restitched into the city's network of transportation, communication and culture. "Under Over Out" is interested in the intersection of architecture and mobility where mobility is more than mere physical conveyance.
By far New York has the highest ridership of public transportation among US cities. A significant percentage of people take the subway, bus, or commuter rail daily. Combined with the options of traveling by foot, bike, or taxi, New York stands as the country's premier model of urban multi-modal transit. Given the great number of people who travel by these means it would seem that the private automobile is not entirely needed. But be that as it may, the automobile is the main means of transportation.
