Spatial Interaction 21: Metabolic perspective on/in space
The module «Spatial Interaction» challenges students to deepen their practical and conceptual knowledge of human interactions in their immediate surroundings. The student projects will connect people and environmental processes with the aim of investigating local impacts of urban (or everyday?) behaviour as well as long-distance effects of individual actions. They will learn how to interface the present mesocosm (collecting environmental data, identifying relationships) and how to anticipate/experiment with advanced techniques like remote sensing or machine vision. Designing in such situations requires the development of strategies for public outreach and communication as well as basic knowledge of intervening in complex systems.
Student projects:
The installation BUBBLETOPIA consists of a large transparent balloon, which contains a small biotope with plants, insects and other organisms, which should represent their habitat. Through the existence of humans and our influence on the natural ecosystem, the habitat of other life forms on our planet is taken and reduced. However, the spectators can enlarge the habitat through active work by re-inflating the balloon with the insects through a pump. This shows that it is possible to rebuild what has been destroyed.
FORIS INTRA (which means "outside, inside" in Latin) shows the gradient from city to nature, inner to outer spaces. This gradient is supported by the course of nature and city as well as by the contrast of outside and inside.
From your exchange with the TURBOMAT emerges a heterotopia – a world within a world, mirroring yet upsetting the system outside it. The beverage isn't free; it just has another value that the vending machine generates for itself.
In our research we discovered that small actions can have a big influence on the environment. For example walking through grass on a certain path regularly, does not allow flowers and other sensitive things to grow or live. The installation KLANGPILZ makes aware of this fact. It is displayed hidden in high grass and therefore not clearly visible at first. The alarm inspired mushrooms start to ring, when a person walks nearby.
