See-Through: Building Facades as Contested Ground
Team: Malini Srivastava, Nathan Anderson
Program: Architecture
Contested ground, a term commonly associated with territorial boundary disputes, recognizes that boundaries don’t belong to one or the other domains they separate. Away from and on either side of the boundary, the status quo is preserved. However, when the boundary is occupied or transgressed, the status quo of ownership and territoriality is challenged and activism and deliberate aggression emerges.
Buildings consume immense amounts of energy in order to mechanically meet narrow definitions of comfort. Exterior wall assemblies are boundary conditions where any inefficiencies make them act like sieves leaking and wasting energy. Yet, this waste is invisible to the human eye. In this work, we documented Rapson Hall's thermography over a two year period and mapped thermographic projections on the building facade. Simultaneously, we proposed a categorization of projective protests on building facades (acontextual, contextual and homeomorphic), and we contextualized our work as a homeomorphic projection.
Our intent is to create forms of climate activism to position the building facade as a contested ground between the public (all forms of life impacted by climate change) and private (those that own and operate inefficient buildings), to instigate aggressive corrective action.
Srivastava, M., & Anderson*, N. See-Through: Building Facades as Contested Ground. ((IN)TANGIBLE HERITAGE(S): Canterbury, UK, 2022). Peer-reviewed/refereed.
Keywords: Activism, Climate Protest, Climate Change, Image Projection
Funders: Imagine Grant from the Office of the Vice President for Research at University of Minnesota.
