Abstract:
The exploration of materiality is a key part of this research, viewed from multiple perspectives. As Peter Zumthor wrote in his essay "A Way of Looking at Things," materials play a role in creation of an architectural atmosphere. He describes the material quality of the work of another artist as "precise and sensuous" which illuminates why materials help to shape our experience of a space. Zumthor says that "materials themselves are not poetic," but that they can gather meaning and power. This work strives to create that same rich, layered experience, which is full of mystery or wonder, in the spaces and forms created, while reflecting how materials that fill them add a certain tangibility, acoustic quality or other specific meaning.
This thesis will focus on the place where concrete materials are "assembled and erected . . . [and] becomes a part of the real world," looking at the creation of forms in a context of the limitations and opportunities of new technology to intersect with craft and tradition
This study has been an exploration of how modern technology can be used in traditional and non-traditional ways to transform materials. Both traditional and non-traditional joints create a static connection, one that if done correctly has limited, if any, movement. Can we use modern technology as a way to explore something more dynamic, something that isn't fixed? How will this transformation change the way we think of the material?
Beginning with case studies on industrial forms and precedent studies on Japanese woodworking and digital fabrication, this thesis ruminates on myriad opportunities to make the fixed fluid. Incorporating research and theory into an extended exploration of materiality and making, this study illuminates the creative process and shows learning done through play, prototyping, extension and production. Although it was not possible to capture every iteration in this book, it captures the processes followed, the tools used, the ideas awakened and the lessons learned.
