This congress calls for papers that will examine the movement of people and things around and across the Indian Ocean Rim and reveal instances or patterns of transfer that may complicate assumed centre-periphery dynamics, or correspond more closely to the idea of South-South cooperation. It looks to engage new political framings like the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) or the Group of 77 (G77) and the resulting New International Economic Order (NIEO) that would reconfigure the transfer of construction materials and labour, and consequently architectural knowledge, across this region. But it also hopes to discuss the potentialities for greater solidarity that emerged from broader philosophical notions of ‘neutralism’ ‘human dignity’ and ‘justice’ and how these have affected the ethics of construction in the Global South. Finally, it is expected that all these considerations will find a place in the discussion of migrant populations and their negotiations with these constructed political and cultural categories, living across and beyond them in a constant state of liminality.
Abstracts (300 words) for proposed papers are invited to be submitted to camea@adelaide.edu.au by 20th June 2021. Congress will meet on 7th-9th November 2021.
Please see the attached Call for Papers for further details:
The University of Liverpool and The National Archives are pleased to announce the availability of a fully funded collaborative doctoral studentship, under the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Collaborative Doctoral Partnership (CDP) scheme.
Using The National Archives extensive collections the project will investigate how the West African ‘built environment’ has been shaped to respond to various political, economic, and welfare demands and ambitions. The particular timeframe will cover the transition from colonial rule into independence period. After tracking these broader notions across ‘British West Africa’, the project will pursue a narrower focus on one of the four former British colonies.
How were ideas of ‘self’, identity, freedom, and so on, expressed through new construction and town planning? How did former colonisers, and other foreign groups attempt to shape and influence these developments in the ‘post-colonial’ period. How were notions of identity, nation, and ‘new beginnings’ expressed by the postcolonial nations?
The aim of the project is to investigate how political ideas, and notions surrounding identity, nationhood, and statecraft are expressed or manifest through the built environment.
Infrastructure, prestige projects, and grand architectural schemes are often used to infer power, or suggest modernity, development, and progress. Equally, more (seemingly) mundane developments, such as housing, can be as revealing in terms of power structures and wider ambition. In a problematic and contested political situation these types of projects become highly charged and significant expressions of a nation’s collective (and often contested) identity. This is even more meaningful in a colonial context, and architecture, town planning and infrastructure, in part, become symbolic expressions of the colonial power.
The objective of this project is to examine these notions within the West African context over a period of time that spans the late colonial era and early post-colonial period. This was a particularly volatile moment, charged with excitement and optimism, and a desire to somehow ‘start again’ and rebuild a new nation with a new vision. Architecture and planning would shift from being expressions of colonial dominance and subjugation to being expressions of nationalism, hope, and modernisation.
It is sometimes tempting to see the event of Independence as an abrupt and sudden moment. The clock strikes twelve and everything suddenly changes – and whilst this is true, it is also oversimplifying a complex event that is, to some degree, still being played-out today. There is also a sense of inertia in the built environment and existing city plans, methods of development, and networks of expertise stubbornly persist and outlast political dynasties.
The desire for the newly independent nations to express their hard-fought freedom through physical, often large-scale triumphant (sometimes infrastructure) projects was met with the former colonial power’s aspiration to continue offering technical assistance, expertise, and trade. It resulted in a complex blend of nationalism, reimagining/reinventing identity and Pan-African ambition, further mixed with the additional influences of ‘non-aligned’ socialist assistance and US, World Bank, and UN concerns.
The independence of these nations was not an abrupt severance from the former colonial power, but a feathered, gradual transition coupled with intense global interest eager to retain or cultivate influence and trade advantage.
It makes for a fascinating narrative that reveals the shift from overt imperialism, to one of post-WW2 ‘technical assistance’, ‘development’, and fiscal packages from an array of competing agencies and organisations, met with a desire to express African modernisation, liberation, and success.
Start date 1st October 2021
Applications due 25th May 2021
Interviews planned for 22nd June 2021
For any enquiries please contact: Professor Iain Jackson on: ijackson@liv.ac.uk
How to Apply: To apply for this studentship, please send the following documents to artsrecruit@liverpool.ac.uk:
Full Curriculum Vitae (CV)
Cover Letter expressing motivation for applying and pursuing a PhD on this topic.
Project Plan: This is your chance to set out how you would like to design and plan the research project and should not exceed 1000 words. Please produce a Project Plan that includes the following headings:
Proposed project outline and suggested research questions
Proposed Methodology
The National Archives / other archival sources to be consulted
Selected Bibliography.
The project can be undertaken on a full-time or part-time basis.
CDP doctoral training grants fund full-time studentships for 45 months (3.75 years) or part-time equivalent. The studentship has the possibility of being extended for an additional 3 months to provide professional development opportunities, or up to 3 months of funding may be used to pay for the costs the student might incur in taking up professional development opportunities.
The student is eligible to claim additional travel and research related expenses (worth up to £1000 per year for four years) during the course of the project, courtesy of The National Archives.
· We want to encourage the widest range of potential students to study for a CDP studentship and are committed to welcoming students from different backgrounds to apply. We particularly welcome applications from Black, Asian, Minority Ethnic backgrounds as they are currently underrepresented at this level in this area.
· Applicants should have an undergraduate degree in subjects allied to the Built Environment/Architecture/History/Cultural Geography.
· A Masters level qualification is desirable but not essential. Applicants may be able to demonstrate equivalent experience in a professional setting (e.g. producing and researching written reports, public outreach and liason, working with collections and archives).
· Experience of working in West Africa is desirable but not essential.
· Applicants must be able to demonstrate an interest in the archives sector and potential and enthusiasm for developing skills more widely in related areas.
· As a collaborative award, students will be expected to spend time at both the University and The National Archives.
This is a joint project with AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Partnership programme. The external partner is the National Archive, Kew. See View Website The award pays full maintenance for all students, both home and international students. The National Minimum Doctoral Stipend for 2021/22 is £15,609, plus an allowance of £1000 per year and a CDP maintenance payment of £550 per year.
Here are the recordings from the Crucibles, Vectors, Catalysts: Envisioning The Modern City, event from 2nd and 9th March 2021. Thank you to all of our excellent speakers, and for the interesting questions and discussions.
PROGRAMME: Session 1: Crucibles, 15:00-16:30 (UTC) Building the Modern City: Expressions of Identity, Change and Power, Moderated by Iain Jackson
This panel will explore state-sponsored programmes, planned cities and masterplans in cities such as Lagos, Tehran and Baghdad. It will examine architecture as expressions of nationalism and nationalist political agendas as well as its relationship to big business, corporations and mercantile ventures.
Rupture, Transition and Continuity in Baghdad’s Master Plans: From Minoprio to Miastoprojekt
Session 2: Vectors, 17:00-18:30 (UTC) Connecting the Modern City: Networks, Alliances and Knowledge Production; Moderated by Clara Kim
This panel will explore the practice of modern architecture through colonial-postcolonial networks and geopolitical alliances. It will explore cities in Mozambique within the context of other Lusophone countries, post-Partition East & West Pakistan, as well as the dissemination of knowledge and technical expertise through pedagogy.
Correspondences, Transfers and Memory: Maputo’s “Age of Concrete”
Farhan Karim (University of Kansas)
Archaeology of the Future: Constantinos Doxiaidis in East and West Pakistan
Patrick Zamarian (University of Liverpool)
Global Perspectives and Private Concerns: The AA’s Department of Tropical Architecture
TUESDAY 9 MARCH Session 3: Catalysts, 15:00-16:30
Fragments of the Modern City: Memories, Echoes and Whispers Moderated by Osei Bonsu
This panel will explore the collaborations, connections and entanglements that developed between art and architecture during a dynamic period of building in Morocco, India and Iraq. It will examine the legacy and afterlives of these projects through the investigation of under-recognised figures and narratives in art and architecture.
Speakers:
Lahbib el Moumni & Imad Dahmani (founders of MAMMA, Mémoire des Architectes Modernes Marocain)
Initiatives toward saving modern heritage of Morocco
Ram Rahman (Photographer/Curator)
Building Modern Delhi, The Nehruvian Post-Independence Renaissance
Amin Alsaden (Independent Scholar)
Syntheses Across Disciplines: Rifat Chadirji and Art-Architecture Liaisons in Modern Baghdad
Explore modern cities and architectural production in the blurred era of the independence and postcolonial period
Join us for three sessions which will bring together scholars, researchers and curators to explore architectural production in the blurred era of independence to the post-colonial period of the mid-20th century, focussing on cities in Africa, Middle East and South Asia.
Whether driven by socialist agendas (Nehruvian in India and Nkrumah in Ghana), monarchies (Pahlavis in Iran and Hashemite in Iraq), quasi colonial protectorates, or pan-continental aspirations, architecture (and especially Modernism) was a key apparatus for nation-building, for re-imagining identities and a means to project and invent a new image of the future. The seminar seeks to explore the use of architecture as both physical infrastructure and symbolic expression, as well as its vulnerability to the vicissitudes of changing politics and policies of the times.
The role of cities as crucibles, vectors and catalysts for developing new expressions of identity, change and power is key. Cities in this period saw the emergence of schools of thought, dynasties and collaborations were formed, networks and ideas were shared and publications were disseminated. While the desire of a newly independent nation was often to consolidate a single national collective identity, it was through the urban centres that strands of coherent, yet often multiple identities were formed. The role of figures such as Rifat Chadirji, Mohamed Makiya, Jane Drew and Maxwell Fry were important as they often operated within multiple cities and cross-cultural contexts that spanned the colonial to postcolonial divide.
These urban centres were either newly built, or they were remade and reimagined through city infrastructure, government buildings, universities, cultural institutions and national monuments. Architecture schools, state sponsored projects and external agencies feed into the discussion and warrant further exploration. The seminar explores the transnational connections, diverse political agendas and complex allegiances which informed architectural development in this period.
Seminar convenors:
Iain Jackson, Professor of Architecture and Research Director, Liverpool School of Architecture
Clara Kim, The Daskalopoulos Senior Curator, International Art, Tate Modern
Nabila Abdel Nabi, Curator, International Art, Tate Modern
PROGRAMME TUESDAY 2 MARCH
Session 1: Crucibles, 15:00-16:30 (UTC)
Building the Modern City: Expressions of Identity, Change and Power
Moderated by Iain Jackson
This panel will explore state-sponsored programmes, planned cities and masterplans in cities such as Lagos, Tehran and Baghdad. It will examine architecture as expressions of nationalism and nationalist political agendas as well as its relationship to big business, corporations and mercantile ventures.
Rupture, Transition and Continuity in Baghdad’s Master Plans: From Minoprio to Miastoprojekt
Session 2: Vectors, 17:00-18:30 (UTC)
Connecting the Modern City: Networks, Alliances and Knowledge Production
Moderated by Clara Kim
This panel will explore the practice of modern architecture through colonial-postcolonial networks and geopolitical alliances. It will explore cities in Mozambique within the context of other Lusophone countries, post-Partition East & West Pakistan, as well as the dissemination of knowledge and technical expertise through pedagogy.
Correspondences, Transfers and Memory: Maputo’s “Age of Concrete”
Fahran Karim (University of Kansas)
Archaeology of the Future: Constantinos Doxiaidis in East and West Pakistan
Patrick Zamarian (University of Liverpool)
Global Perspectives and Private Concerns: The AA’s Department of Tropical Architecture
TUESDAY 9 MARCH
Session 3: Catalysts, 15:00-16:30 (UTC)
Fragments of the Modern City: Memories, Echoes and Whispers
Moderated by Nabila Abdel Nabi
This panel will explore the collaborations, connections and entanglements that developed between art and architecture during a dynamic period of building in Morocco, India and Iraq. It will examine the legacy and afterlives of these projects through the investigation of under-recognised figures and narratives in art and architecture.
Speakers:
Lahbib el Moumni & Imad Dahmani (founders of MAMMA, Mémoire des Architectes Modernes Marocain)
Initiatives toward saving modern heritage of Morocco
Ram Rahman (Photographer/Curator)
Building Modern Delhi, The Nehruvian Post-Independence Renaissance
Amin Alsaden (Independent Scholar)
Syntheses Across Disciplines: Rifat Chadirji and Art-Architecture Liaisons in Modern Baghdad
Architectural Training and Research in the Foreign Aid-Funded Knowledge Economy, 1950s-1980s.
Two-day symposium, KTH School of Architecture, Stockholm, 9-10 September 2021.CALL FOR PAPERS / Submission deadline: 1 April 2021.
From the 1950s to the late 1980s, the politics and economies of foreign aid – instigated by both the ‘capitalist West’ as well as the ‘communist East’ – gave rise to a whole infrastructure destined to assist the progress of ‘developing countries’ on their ‘path to development’. The various North-South exchanges that took place in the name of ‘development’ have left a deep imprint on the geopolitical landscape of postcolonial Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Largely instituted through bilateral relations between individual states, these ‘aid’ initiatives involved not only financial and material resources but also various forms of knowledge and expertise; as such, the modalities of this global, foreign aid-funded infrastructure boosted the creation and reinforcement of all sorts of institutional actors to efficiently exchange knowledge – largely through training courses, educational programs and/or research projects. In the light of widespread rural migration and intensive, rapid urbanization processes, expertise on the built environment was a particularly salient form of knowledge to the aims of foreign aid. Hence, architecture, urbanism and planning were no strangers to an emerging foreign aid-funded knowledge economy – a context in which the production and circulation of knowledge were intimately tied to the political-economic value attributed to them by foreign aid diplomacy.
How did architectural knowledge figure in foreign aid-sourced international relations, and what frameworks were set in place to efficiently exchange that knowledge?
For this two-day symposium, we seek scholarly work that critically analyzes, contextualizes, or theorizes the establishment and functioning of such institutional actors, training courses, educational programs, research centers, and other infrastructures for knowledge exchange that emerged under the aegis of development and targeted ‘Third World’ clients. We welcome a wide range of methodological and creative perspectives as well as less empirical (but well-informed) theoretical approaches that interpret this phenomenon from a postcolonial or decolonizing perspective. We also encourage contributions that scrutinize the intersections of these histories with discussions of gender, race, religion and nationalism.
This two-day symposium will be held in Stockholm on 9-10 September 2021. In light of the current pandemic the event will be organized either in a hybrid format, allowing for both in-person and online attendance, or, if health regulations dictate, as a fully online event. The symposium is envisioned as one long, thematically well-focused discussion, without parallel strands, and aims to bring 12 to 15 established as well as young scholars together from every discipline that engages with the topics outlined above. We’re happy to receive anonymized abstracts of up to 300 words and 1 optional image until 1 April 2021, submitted via email to architectureforeignaid@arch.kth.se. Acceptance will be dependent on an anonymous review of the abstract by the scientific committee. If a different format than that of a presentation based on a paper would be more suitable to your work, please contact us (same deadline applies).
Scientific committee: Sebastiaan Loosen (KTH), Erik Sigge (MIT), Helena Mattsson (KTH), Viviana d’Auria (KU Leuven) and Kenny Cupers (University of Basel).
Please find the full CFP attached and visit our website for up-to-date information: architectureforeignaid.arch.kth.se Best regards Sebastiaan Loosen, Erik Sigge & Helena Mattsson
International Perspectives on the Future of Architecture and Urbanism in the Post-COVID Age Online Symposium, January 29-30, 2021, 11am-2pm US Eastern Time
Organizers: Mohammad Gharipour and Caitlin DeClercq, Epidemic Urbanism Initiative
Long before the appearance of COVID-19, the urban fabric of cities across the world had been shaped by prior epidemics. Indeed, the study of historic, global epidemics has illuminated the many ways in which urban life and architecture have changed during times of pestilence. With the outbreak of each epidemic has come new scientific understandings of disease, new modes of governing of social life and interaction, novel efforts to intervene in and prevent infection, the exacerbation of social inequities, and the creation of new occupational and social roles. Each of these outcomes has been enacted and emplaced in the built environment over time and across diverse geographies through the design or re-design of buildings and public spaces, the quarantine or redirection of goods and people, the adoption of new social roles, and the imposition of new urban design policies and practices. Spanning two days, this symposium, comprised of scholars and practitioners from twenty countries, will confront the impacts of this pandemic on cities and imagine new possibilities for a post-COVID urban landscape through topics including:
January 29th, 2021 (11am-2pm EST) topics: Response and Experience; Ecology and Sustainability; and Education and Pedagogy
January 30th, 2021 (11am-2pm EST) topics: Design and Interventions; Healthcare Design; and Social Justice and Equity
Register for this conference at https://bit.ly/EpidemicUrbanism to join us for one or both days. If you have any questions, please contact epidemicurbanism@gmail.com. The deadline for registration is January 25th. This virtual conference is sponsored by the AIA Design & Health Research Consortium (DHRC). The Epidemic Urbanism Initiative (EUI) was founded by Dr. Mohammad Gharipour and Dr. Caitlin DeClercq in March 2020. This is the fourth international conference hosted by the EUI. All prior conferences and additional conversations are publicly available at the EUI YouTube channel.
Panel 1. Response and Experience (Friday, January 29) Moderator: Eliana Abu-Hamdi Murchie (USA) Impacts of COVID-19 on Liming as a Form of Commoning in Trinidad and Tobago Nicole de Lalouvière and Renelle Sarjeant (Trinidad and Switzerland) Superblocks as a Promising Pandemic Response and Experience in Barcelona, Spain Federico Camerín, Luca Fabris, and Riccardo Balzarotti (Italy) Paradigm Shift of Work and the Workplace amid the Pandemic in the UAE Mouza Al Neyadi and Kheira Aoul (UAE) Experiential Learning to Support Remote Instruction in an Australian Architecture Design Studio Ross T. Smith and Cecilia de Marinis (Australia) Protective Barriers in US Cities During and After the COVID-19 Pandemic Aki Ishida (USA)
Panel 2. Ecology and Sustainability (Friday, January 29) Moderator: Michael Vann (USA) Landscape and Eco-systemic Intensification Strategies During and After Pandemics in Milan, Italy Andrea Oldani (Italy) Communities, Schools, and Future Ecologies in Washington DC, USARebecca Milne, Sean O’Donnell, and Bruce Levine (USA) Urban Form and Thermally Comfortable Pedestrian Streetscapes in Post-COVID Mendoza, Argentina Maria B. Sosa, Erica Correa, and Maria A. Canton (Argentina) Emergency Responsive Design in Housing Typologies in the Post-COVID Kigali, Rwanda Manlio Michieletto (Rwanda)
Panel 3. Education and Pedagogy (Friday, January 29) Moderator: Ashraf Salama (Scotland) Equitable Remote Design Education in the Post-COVID the American Great Plains Bud Shenefelt (USA) Implications for Placemaking Pedagogy in an Archipelagic Setting during Pandemics in the Philippines Richard Carraga, Shirley Maraya, Maria Joelyca Sescon, and Iderlina Mateo-Babiano (The Philippines and Australia) An Online Student Workshop as a Pedagogical Experiment Necessitated by COVID-19 in Serbia Mladen Pešić and Miloš Kostić (Serbia) Pedagogical Responses to COVID-19 and Rethinking Norms of Architectural Education in the UAEAhmad Sukkar and Emad Mushtaha (UAE) Assessing the Experience of Virtual Learning Techniques in an Urban Design Studio in the USAHessam Ghamari and Nasrin Golshany (USA)
Panel 4. Design and Interventions (Saturday, January 30)Moderator: Louisa Iarocci (USA) The Fall of Starchitecture and the Future of Architectural Practice in the Post-COVID UK Elizabeth Walder (Wales) Urban Design and Public Transport in the Age of Pandemics in Harare, Zimbabwe Brilliant Mavhima (Zimbabwe) Envisioning a Post-COVID Hybrid Work/Housing Solution in an Architectural Studio in Berlin, Germany Robinson Michel (Germany) Sustaining Safe Construction Operations in the U.S. During COVID-19 Babak Memarian, Sara Brooks, and Jean Christophe Le (USA)
Panel 5. Healthcare Design (Saturday, January 30) Moderator: Anjali Joseph (USA) Spatial Strategies to Separate COVID Patients within Hospital Building Infrastructure Pleuntje Jellema, Ann Heylighen, and Margo Annemans (Belgium) Hospital Ward Flexibility, Equity, and Virus Exposure Risk in Freetown, Sierra Leone Stavroula K. Koutroumpi (England) Rethinking Personal Space Needs in Hospital Settings in the Post-COVID Era Lusi Morhayim (Israel) Epidemic Metabolism in Oncology Hospital Design Practices during the Post-COVID Age Katarina Andjelkovic (Serbia) Visualizing Healthcare Design’s Alternative Futures through Technical and Typological InnovationJeremy Kargon and Rolf Haarstad (USA)
Panel 6. Social Justice and Equity (Saturday, January 30) Moderator: Irene Hwang (USA) Responding to an Unequal Society through Agile and Adaptable Teaching Strategies in South Africa Melinda Silverman and Sandra Felix (South Africa) Pandemics and the Exacerbation of Social Inequities in Urban Informal Settlements in Pakistan Amna Shahzad (Pakistan) Reinterpretation of Traditional Urban Space and Social Justice in the Post-COVID Lagos, Nigeria Timothy Odeyale (Nigeria) Shared, Accessible, and Healthy Streets in Post-Pandemic American Cities Celen Pasalar and George Hallowell (USA)
With a formal existence spanning early modern to contemporary history, the British Empire supported complex networks of trade, war and settlement. It intervened in land-based expansions as well as maritime worlds and prefigured a global architectural history. Yet research that seeks to critically address the empire and its legacy poses complex challenges for the architectural historian: the mental-mapping of bureaucratic systems across multiple continents, finding evidence of buildings and landscapes for which little documentation exists, sitting with a complex past and present of race, gender, religion, nationalism and capitalism.
This writing group is formed as an empathetic structure for scholars writing books and dissertations on imperial and colonial histories. We seek to create a space for researchers to share resources on chapter writing, structuring and revision. Writing is often an isolating activity, particularly for emerging scholars with non-Eurocentric specialisations that are underrepresented in the academy. To this end, we especially encourage applications from early-career researchers and those whose primary field sites are located outside of Great Britain. This project is among the first within the society’s new Race and Ethnicity network, a new effort to foster greater equality, diversity and inclusivity within the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain.
The group will meet for two hours every two months, with participants alternating between workshopping their own draft chapters and that of another in the writing group. Participants must commit to reviewing and presenting once every four months. To mitigate time zones and geographies, all events will be held over Zoom.
HOW TO JOIN
To join, please send a one-page cover letter and a brief project abstract to info@sahgb.org.uk with the subject line ‘Application: Writing Group on Architecture and Empire’ by 15 January 2021. The cover letter should state why you would like to be a part of the group and your general meeting availability, and the abstract should address the dissertation or book project you hope to work on as part of the writing group. All interested participants will be notified by 31 January 2021. The group will meet every other month beginning in February 2021. The meeting times, format and specific group expectations will be refined amongst participants during the first meeting and reviewed on a regular basis.
This thematic section of ABE Journal, edited by Jiat-Hwee Chang and Daniel J. Ryan, explores the wide-ranging socio-environmental implications of comfort for architectural history. The contributions over this and the next issue complicate and expand upon our understanding of comfort. Each essay unpacks how comfort was situated and assembled in the built environment of different temporalities and geographies, beyond the taken-for-granted immediacy of the present and the discursive familiarity of temperate European and North American contexts.
“The five zones showing in a graphic manner the climates, peoples, industries and productions of the earth” published by Western Publishing House, Chicago, in 1887
Drawing from the cognate fields of scholarship in, among others, Science and Technology Studies, Postcolonial Studies, and Sociology of Practice, the contributions show how, during the past two centuries, comfort and the built environment were historically entangled with (settler) colonialism and decolonization, and the various (dis)enchantments of modernities and modernization in Asia, Australia, Latin America, and West Africa. By understanding comfort in relation to these cross-cultural and cross-climatic encounters, these contributions have far-reaching implications for comprehending our shifting and situated relationships with not just built environmental transformations but also planetary climate change.
We are delighted to offer researchers at select partner universities an opportunity to apply for one of University in Liverpool’s Virtual Fellowships.
The Fellowships are open to researchers working in the field of heritage and are open to early career as well as established researchers.
The Fellowships provide an opportunity for selected candidates to gain collaborative research experience in an international research environment with the aim of publishing or co-publishing a specific piece of research in an international journal or equivalent venue and fostering long-term collaboration.
The Fellowships are fully online and travel to the UK is not required.
Successful candidates will have the opportunity to collaborate virtually with a research group or designated individuals at the University of Liverpool.
The Fellowship will offer:
one to one research mentoring, including support in analytical and interpretive methods in heritage research: this will be delivered at a distance through zoom or similar platforms
relief from teaching and other duties to pursue the completion and write-up of a piece of research for publication
access to online research resources and training including GIS training; Photogrammetry; AutoCAD and visualisation (3D Max); 3D scanning; Fieldwork/ documentation methods support and guidance with academic writing in English
opportunities for research collaboration through “virtual” participation in relevant research group activities in Liverpool.
Impatient Cities of the Gulf: Post-oil Architecture in Flux – Call for Papers – HPA 8/2021
Today’s general perception of Gulf cities is based on the assumption of a futuristic vision; a visionary development and a cluster of hi-tech constructions.
Since the striking of oil, this ‘brave new world’ has been a testing ground for experimental, risk imbued architecture and real estate. The sudden affluence and ambition of the rulers to demonstrate progress and social advancements (sometimes expressed through outlandish ‘iconic’ designs) has certainly fired this drive. The building of cities seemed an appropriate culvert for the vast funds generated, turning what was once barren into a fertile land.
Furthermore, there is an ever-present sense of the ‘tabula-rasa approach’ that forced (or perhaps tempted) architects to pursue different and alternative design processes. Gulf cities seem to permit the idea, if not always the reality, of being able to ‘start again’, to be re-made, re-imagined and re-Modernised. There is a sense of being forever in the ‘now’, with ‘historical’ projects stretching back mere decades. Perhaps this desire to continually reinvent brought about shortcomings in early Modernist paradigms, and the rapid rise of new social/cultural/artistic concepts (such as pop art/metabolism/structuralism/post-modernism/idiosyncratic and so on).
These preliminary reflections offer an image of the Gulf as a fluid ambit that challenged designers for several decades in the light of a central question: how do architects build in a place with a constantly changing context? How are ideas of history, tradition, memory, and heritage constructed in this flux?
In the second half of the 20th century, the circumstantial conditions generated a series of experimental, utopian, sometimes unbuildable projects with a high level of idealisation. Some are renowned such proposals as Wright’s plan for Baghdad or the Smithsons’ Kuwait mat-building. Many are still to be unearthed as they were shelved and never implemented, or abandoned along the way, altered or demolished.
In other cases, the region’s specific constraints – such as limited material availability, narrow construction time and harsh climate, led architects to original ideas, technologies, and procurement methods with highly inventive and analytical processes.
Moreover, modern architecture in the Gulf seems somehow different for sporting an urge for negotiating the local context by ‘flirting’ with traditional elements of locality, such as geometrical motifs, shapes, textures or colour palette. The liberal application of decorative motifs, patterns, applied ornamentation needs careful examination, especially when it is so diligently applied to forms and arrangements more generally associated with a more austere modernist agenda.
The editors invite papers that extend the discussion on the Gulf built environment during the modernisation era, over the duality global/local as terms in opposition. Contributions are encouraged to analyse different architectural narratives, approaches and schools of thought to compensate the assumption that flattens ‘modernity’ as a one-directional, repetitive and monotone practice acquired and acritically transplanted into the Arab Peninsula.
Focusing on the second half of the 20th century, and with an eye on the contemporary implications, possible topics include, but they are not limited to:
– Experimental and inventive design practices
– Global aspiration and local constraints
– Context negotiation
– Materiality
– Knowledge exchanges and bijective practices
– Modernity, tradition and transition
– De-colonial urbanism
– Identity formation and the built environment
– Place-making, streetscapes and scale
Authors must submit directly full papers using www.hpa.unibo.it.
Please, fill in the author’s profile with all the information required as:
• Applicant’s name
• Professional affiliation
• Title of paper
• Abstract
• 5 keywords
• A brief CV (max 2,000 characters)
Please submit the proposal in the form of MS Word (length between 4,200 and 8,500 characters). The submitted paper must be anonymous. Please delete from the text and file’s properties all information about name, administrator etc. Papers should clearly define the argument in relation to the available literature and indicate the sources which the paper is based on.
All papers received will go through a process of double-blind peer review before publication.
Transnational Architecture Group 