Can we overcome the assumption that urban environments are static, passive systems? In questioning and rethinking our expectations, we learn that architecture can transform itself in response to the constant change of our surroundings.

The 10-day architectural workshop AA Visiting School ‘Form as (Dynamic) Unknown’ is an experimental laboratory in which kinetic interactive structures are researched and designed. International students develop novel solutions, building upon the experiments of great Italian innovators. Drawing on the work of Leonardo Da Vinci, participants design robotic systems inspired by nature. Projects will transform by adapting to environmental conditions and social behaviours happening at real and virtual levels. The internet, similar to the SuperSurface prophesied by SuperStudio, is considered as the virtual layer of data-exchange cutting across Rome and the rest of the world.

By the end of the workshop students will have developed their own interpretation of the future of architecture. Advancing design strategies that embrace the complex and unpredictable nature of the city will lead to forms as “dynamic unknown”.

Projects

re-for(u)m
Konstantinos Kotsyfis, Mariel Cremlis, Martina Rosati, Sofia Weller
Insect Invasion
Graziantonio Ceglie, Aidan Carruthers, Jinting Yang, Lu Meng Yue
Weave XY
Valentina Angelucci, Angelo Figliola, Tian Miao, Alexander Walzer
Adaptive Interpolated Geometry
Benjamin Stevenson, Elnaz Ghazi, Fabio Gastaldello, Mattia Santi
Elastic Morphogenesis
Federico Cosimo Biancullo, Federico Borello, Massimiliano Manno
Infection
Chris Borg Costanzi, Mostafa Rabea, Zhanna Nazarenko, Wei An Wang
Rotational Strategies
Elaine Bonavia, Paolo Franco, Lorenzo Massimiano, Costanza Santovetti
Y-Control
Alessandro Fisalli, Alessia Guidomei, Stefano Lanfredi, Salvatore Viscuso

Teaching staff

The programme is directed by Lorenzo Vianello, architect at Foster + Partners, and Arturo Tedeschi, architect and independent researcher. The workshop will be held by the two directors with Lawrence Friesen, tutor at the AA, and Josef Musil, architect at Foster + Partners.

Venue

Galleria di architettura “Come Se”, via dei Bruzi 4 –  Rome (Italy).

Website

For additional informations go to the AA WEBSITE: http://www.aaschool.ac.uk/STUDY/VISITING/rome

The AA Visiting School is a platform created by the Architectural Association School of London to further extend this engagement and to learn from the realities of today’s highly distributed, global architectural culture. Since its launch in January 2008 in Dubai with a small design workshop led by AA tutors and a brilliant group of local partners and supporting networks, the AA Visiting School has grown into a worldwide programme of short courses, design and research workshops of extraordinary depth, quality and learning.

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