The exhibition's journey, in itself, is a traversal between languages and serves as a metaphor for the ideological translation of its contents. Throughout the exhibit, imperfect interpretations of the work occur through a series of translucent yet opaque textiles that divide the gallery interior. These textiles separate the viewer from the exhibited material and concurrently serve as corridors through the space. The fabric's optical quality forms ethereal, wispy projections that lie just beyond the grasp of perception. By selectively concealing architectural models, allusions are made to the discovery and realization of an idea during the design process. Ideas with hazy, undefined edges that reside within the realm of consciousness until they are translated into reality. Shadows cast by the concealed models lurk and sway in the exhibition room, like scattered concepts, observed by the visitor as they enter the designer's mind. These ideas float in space as a collection of imagined architecture. Through our installation, the intention is to tear away the boundaries of the built environment, represented physically by Tadao Ando's architecture. How the building and the exhibition interact will serve as an investigation into a situational approach to architecture that revels in distortion and ambiguity.
Throughout the gallery will be models coauthored by the architects of the exhibition. As a medium of architecture, the model is an object that is easy to understand because of its inherent physicality. Even in its imperfections – strands of glue, remnants of fingerprints – the model reveals what cannot be perceived in drawings and renderings. However, it also becomes a tool that explores the subdividing branches of an ever-evolving idea. In this way, the model is capable of freezing a moment in the design process as a tangible entity. Through the incremental aggregation of these captured volatile states, the architect can begin to study and compare the efficacy of ideological translations between models. With every model's material, structural, and aesthetic shift, a new set of mistranslations are introduced. As the model grows in scales of magnitude, it must contend with the realities of the physical world: the weight of material, the efficacy of structure, the connection of components. Styrene, acrylic, and glue translate into concrete, glass, and silicone. What value, then, do mistranslations hold? Although "mistranslation" construes an innate negativity, it provides a generative opportunity to utilize the unexpected remnants of process to create development. In the realm of biology, genetic mistranslations are the tools by which organisms evolve and survive. We are in interested embracing mistranslations as a method of refining architectural design.
Text: Ken Farris, Alexandre Vicente
Organizers: Ken Farris, Alexandre Vicente
with the participation of Thomas Daniell
and the colaboration of: Guido Saldana, Tomoco Tagawa, Hideo Wada, Andrew Chee, Seiji Date, Juliana Yang
Title
MistranslationsType
ExhibitionOrganizers
From
July 29, 2023 11:00 PMUntil
August 06, 2023 11:00 PMVenue
Nipponbashi Gallery, OsakaAddress