EROS & EMBODIED KNOWLEDGE
towards the reinvention of the architecture practice
Jolien Naeyaert
Master studio – Brussels
2023-2024 – 1st semester – English
Mediating Tactics Engagement
“The erotic is the nurturer or nursemaid of all our deepest knowledge.” (Audre Lorde, 1978)
Designing by means of embodied knowledge; intuitively, sensorial, emotional, subjective, tactile, physical. How can ‘Eros’ – of which Audre Lorde speaks in her essay ‘Uses of the Erotic. The Erotic as Power.’ (1978) – be implemented within the architecture practice?
Which design methodology, orientation, handwriting, form of knowledge, space emerges when we look, feel, listen, deep inside ourselves? Do we all dare to look each of our authenticity and ‘urge’ in the eye to develop suitable tools in the setup of an idiosyncratic architecture practice? Can these embodied ways of knowing also establish a collective practice, space and/or form of knowledge?
The location of the master studio transforms gradually and takes on several shapes:
…with a nod towards Virginia Woolf’s ‘A Room of One’s Own’ (1929)…
YOUR OWN BODY
YOUR OWN ROOM
A COLLECTIVE ROOM
These rooms can be both physical (in-situ), mental as corporeal/performative. They are explored and given shape by means of different media (drawing, text, video, audio, performance, movement, …). Exchange of knowledge is at core within the studio, in a very physical way; moving together, openly reflecting together, exploring together, eating together, dancing together, questioning together, sketching together, being together, walking together, creating together.
“When we begin to live from within outward, in touch with the power of the erotic…, then we begin to be responsible to ourselves in the deepest sense.” (Audre Lorde, 1978)
To be(come) ‘response-able’, reaching out towards other disciplines and forms of collaborating, this master studio resonates with the Mediating Tactics Engagement.
Sources:
LORDE. A., (1978). Uses of the Erotic. The Erotic as Power. Uit Sister Outsider. Crossing Press, Berkley. Listen to Audre Lorde herself via: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aW9gw4Rq0