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(21-22) The Drawing and the Space

The Drawing and the Space.
Master Dissertation studio, academic year 2021-22, Ghent
Promotoren: Thierry Lagrange – Jo Van Den Berghe

This master dissertation studio will be taught in Dutch / Deze masterproefstudio zal in het Nederlands gegeven worden)

This master dissertation studio is linked, through its promoters, with the research group The Drawing and the Space (www.thedrawingandthespace.info) (https://architectuur.kuleuven.be/departementarchitectuur/english/research/onderzoeksgroepen/the-drawing-and-the-space).

Drawing and space share a common history, and all along these historical lines—that reach as far as today—strong dependencies between the drawing and the space exist, which appear to make them inseparable, both in the conception and in the observation and understanding of space. In designing, looked at from a historical perspective, space is often that which drives designers to drawing, whereas drawing is often that which leads to new spaces. Innovative ways of drawing have led to innovative concepts of space. The urge for the latter has often instigated the quest for the former. This co-existence of both entities requires intense collaborations that lead to crosspollinations, and this constitutes the base of this research environment. We believe that bringing these together may deeply change our view on this research landscape, and further expand it.

The architectural drawing and the analogous space are also examined in their historical context. It is important that every student brings his/her relevant/necessary historical references into the research.

The student takes a clear position in the tension field between the architectural drawing and the analogous space, and with this he/she explores both his/her own critical reflective practice and meaningful undercurrents / countercultures through designing new architecture propositions, by proving the feasibility of these propositions (materialization and anatomizing them in their contexts) and by carefully situating them in the discipline of architecture. This master’s thesis can have a significant impact because it incorporates new practices that gradually will infiltrate into the heart of the discipline.

The architectural whole (including intimate dialogues with the context), the architectural fragment (the strategic intermediate scale) and the architectural detail are the three scales on which the student will operate judiciously in this Design Driven Research. These three scales are investigated in an integrated way throughout the entire process, with alternating accents on one of these scales. The architectural drawing, and certainly the vertical section, will occupy a central place in the research method as a discipline-specific instrument.

The program and context can be freely determined by the student, but will result from a careful analysis of possibilities, which will be debated in the design studio, based on a dialogal high trust collaboration between the student and his/her promoters, imbedded in a network with any mentor the student can choose. This network forms an interdisciplinary Community of Practice in which the student can achieve a better rating of his / her research and design actions, and in which the individual processes are more precisely nurtured and calibrated.

The reflection note is one of the workpieces. This is an extensive paper, an in-depth reflection on the theme of the architectural drawing and the analogous space and the positioning of one’s own work as a new critical reflective practice. This paper shows a developed discourse on the meaning of the current architectural acting.

The student consults with the other students to arrive at a balanced exhibition as the setting for the presentation of the master’s thesis project for an external jury. Even though this master dissertation is part of the Dutch Master, it is a fruitful tradition of many years to present its output in English for an international jury of practitioners and scholars.

Studio brief as pdf.

Impressie Masterproefjury academiejaar 2017-18

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