ADS0: Zero Objective: Staging Space in Suspended Time

This year we will develop a clear scope of design by focussing on the prototype, or 1:1 object, as a key component within larger speculative forms of scenography, installation, and performance. This focus explores the object's spatial and narrative capacities as a staging device, while also examining the staging of space as a practice that questions how to affect, or mediate, the relationship between the staged and the ongoing spectacle of reality.

ADS0 interrogates how architecture is preoccupied with a positivist interpretation of the building industry. The studio pursues that objective by exploring new forms of agency for spatial practice within scenography, installation, and performance. Over the year, we will investigate the fringes between architecture and art, considering the history of spatial practice in art through a curated series of 10 expert seminars, culminating in highly innovative and personal projects.

ADS0 questions objectivity in general and specifically opposes architecture as a discipline dedicated to what can be collectively validated as 'objective'. The studio explores how the personal, autobiographical, and subjective can initiate a spatial practice, and how, in return, the collective can inform the underlying spatial discourse. This approach challenges the relationships between the subjective and objective, the personal and collective. It explores how the personal is capable of triggering the collective imagination, expanding the relevance of the personal beyond a self–centered domain through the consideration of social agendas and collective urgencies.

The studio continues with its autobiographical approach. At the centre of the studio's program remains biologist Jakob Von Uexküll's 1907 theory of the Umwelt, which formulates that every living organism actively creates a highly unique and self-centered 'image' or 'model' of the world it inhabits. This mental image or model merely constitutes a partial, incomplete and subjective representation of reality. Through an ongoing and interactive process of communication and feedback-loops all living organisms constitute their own Umwelt, or model of the world.

Umwelt theory states that the mind and the world of every living organism are inseparable, because it is the mind that interprets the world for the organism. Consequently, the Umwelten of different organisms in one living environment will differ, which follows the individuality and uniqueness of the history of every single organism. This theory hereby states that in every environment there are as many Umwelten as there are living organisms. The theory challenges our common notion of reality; it is no longer considered as that external 'objective' condition which can be detached from all the organisms living in it, rather, is reformulated as an internal and subjective condition exclusively resulting from the organism's individual perception. The Umwelt thus constitutes reality as it is perceived by the individual living organism, it is by nature non-detachable from its subject and autobiographical in every sense.

ADSO wishes to explore this concept of Umwelt as a spatial category which challenges our notions of architecture and space and which demands new formats of representation using multiple combinations of different audiovisual, scenographic, linguistic or performative media. The studio will challenge our common notions about space and architecture, evoking a more tangible and material concept from art practice –the Environment.

Environments constitute a site for exhibiting, while also referring to the installation and performance art that originating during the 1960s. The Environment can be defined as an coherent, enclosed, spatial system, which communicates a partial and subjective view of the world by establishing its own codes, protocols, and experiences that depend on the use of multiple audiovisual, scenographic, linguistic, and performative media. Similar to the Umwelt, environments are generated as discursive models for both existing and possible worlds, offering a platform for speculative design practice. Zero Objective considers the environment as a speculative form of scenography within which we will explore the spatial and narrative capacities of the 1/1 object as a staging device.

The year is focussed on the prototype, or 1:1 object, as part of (a stageset, an installative environment, or a performative installation. We will explore the spatial and narrative capacities of the object as a staging device, while simultaneously interrogating the staging of space as a creative practice. Our work will try to understand the relationship between the staged and the ongoing spectacle of reality. By focussing on the 1:1 object, ADS0 will fully embrace the acts of making and material experimentation. Term 1 will be dedicated to a series of experimental assessments, combined with the development of content, complexity, and nuance through research and presentation. By investigating materiality, tectonic explorations of form, and the staging of the object in space and time, we will constantly shift between speculative experimentation and critical observation.

ADS0 cultivates a perspective on space that is deliberately innocent, but which has a potential to develop critical narratives as the project unfolds. Zero observation relies on the unintentional gaze as its initial form of observation. The gaze scans the unfolding of reality as if it were a scene in a movie, observing the ongoing spectacle as the unfolding of a plot, and subconsciously embracing instability as an object of interest and the potential trigger for change, drama, tension or conflict. This links our mode of observation to inherently scopic forms; cinema, photography, and theatre, offering a lens through which we can observe those moments the ancient Greeks described as ‘katastrophei’, or the upending of events in a play. It is also what Alfred Hitchcock called the 'moment of suspense' and what Henri Cartier Bresson termed the 'decisive moment'.

Within the context of our studio ‘katastrophei’ becomes the moment of transformation, in which time is slowed, and the elements of the plot coincide within the single frame. The studio uses ‘katastrophei’ as a dramaturgical, or narrative, concept for the staging of space. We are less interested in disasters, than everyday events which that lead to change. We only agree with catastrophists in the sense ‘catastrophe’ invokes ideas of both destruction and renewal, the deepening of dominant forces and the emergence of new forces. Through its conflictual nature, a catastrophic is therefore often the reverse of what was expected. Everyday catastrophes reveal the borders between the expected and unexpected, normal and abnormal, acceptable and unacceptable, progress or regression.

PERSONAL NOTE : a staged object suspended in time

During an evening walk at the end of August, my horizon momentarily inverted as a huge construct suddenly appeared in the clear blue sky. A predominantly horizontal cloud-body seemed to have found a connection to the earth, bending it into a vertical state and leading it as an eary column back to the horizon. Within an instant (the decisive moment of my phone’s snapshot) this scene transformed into what I experienced as a staged event somewhat suspended in space and time. It’s content & configuration urged me to deconstruct what exactly it was that I was observing and invited me to reconstruct its plausible causes. As in a play or in a movie, the scene unfolded itself as the overturning of a plot. The plot of my peaceful evening walk suddenly extended into dimensions with global proportions, opening up narratives linked to building, industry, regional economy and even to European politics. The ongoing bucolic play of the countryside that surrounded me underwent a radical and sudden overturning as my usual evening walk’s lingering state of mind and rather uninhibited gaze abruptly came to a halt and went from zero objective into full focus. My observational mode turned from unconscious to conscious, from daydream to awareness and my activity immediately shifted from the sensorial experience of the wanderer to the rather cognitive or emotional analysis of a spectator. That moment in time convinced me once more that the experience of an object staged in space is actually capable of drastically reframing a person’s relationship with the ongoing spectacle of the unfolding reality as a whole. Some 12 minutes earlier then the instant of my snapshot and at a distance of some 17 km away, a tiny electrical device connected to a solar panel on the roof of the largest distribution-centre of building-materials in Flanders, went into malfunction due to persistent extreme summer temperatures above 50 degrees Celsius and after being tested above its standard capacities for days on end. This meaninglessly tiny malfunction consequently set fire to a company’s 100.000 m2 building and destroyed it’s content worth months of building material reserves for the entire Flemish region. The event will probably result in massive economical damage, in months of technical unemployment for hundreds of people, in even a potential annulation of building projects for several years across an entire region and in yet another massive exhaust of carbon dioxide initiated by presumed green technologies. A 257 kb snapshot of an at first glance seemingly innocent cloud suspended in stime slowly unfolded and revealed its disruptive potential.

We run the studio as an artist collective; a group of individuals each developing their own trajectory through pro-active and tuned in coaching. Every student is intensively guided into the development of their practice and personal discourse on a longer term. As a result, the studio’s projects display a diverse body of work, offering a multitude of unique perspectives on the contemporary world we live in. Every year, the studio constitutes another temporary collective, it emerges from our collective dynamic, and so does its organization, as we discuss and organize the studio together. However, guided by a theoretical framework, building progressively the body of work of the studio, a continuous, ongoing exploration and critique of what life is in our times. The studio deliberately embraces change, conflict, instability, and ambiguity as a basis for its methodological approach. We agree with catastrophists in that, catastrophes invoke ideas of destruction but also of renewal, of the deepening of dominating forces, but the emergence of new ones.

Term 1: Staging Space in Suspended Time: 3 Experiments

ADS0 is inspired by Steve Salembier's artistic practice, together with his installation and performative work. We will begin the year with a series of experiments in which all students are invited to explore different hybrid techniques of representation combining the use of found footage, digital video-collages, models, sculptural objects, installative multimedia work, etc. ADS0 begins with 3 experiments: 'Zero 1:1'; 'Stage Set without a Play'; and 'Live Scenography'. Each experiment has a different focus: 'Zero 1:1' is a staging device; 'Stage Set without a Play' explores the possibilities of narrative; and 'Live Scenography' involves the collective staging of space by the whole studio.

Through these experiments, each student will accumulate content through material play, creating the basic elements or building blocks for their design project. Simultaneously, students will also begin to develop their individual interests, exploring the potential themes and topics in reference to their personal Umwelt and inquiries framed around questions of affinities, urgencies and agency. Conceptually, this will frame the design project that is developed in Terms 2&3.

Experiment #1: Zero 1:1

The Zero 1:1 has one purpose; the capacity to transform space from one state to another, and therefore creating a moment of 'katastrophe'. We will consider the: materiality of this object; how it is constructed; how it can have a structural integrity; and how it allows spatial actions, such as repositioning, folding, sliding, rotating, tilting, hanging, opening, closing, dragging, etc. The Zero 1:1 will be designed and built within two weeks, using cheap materials and a maximum dimension, before the moment of katastrophè, which can contain a standing human body.

Experiment #2: Stage Set without a Play

In this experiment, the studio will explore how to stage narratives in space. We will design a stage set as a 1/20 physical model of a standard performance stage in a small-sized venue. The programme of this set will not be informed by a spectacle, play, or movie, but rather by an individually selected theme composed from two words (an adjective and a noun). This theme must speak of ongoing spatial shifts; forms of opposition or conflict; societal struggles; spatial ambiguities in the city; or eccentric phenomena.

The challenge of this four week experiment is to turn these themes into pictorial sets that communicate with the spectator entirely through their spatial configuration, materiality, and object arrangements. Rather than being literal, this model should provide an associative and abstracted transformation of the theme.

Experiment #3: Live Scenography

Finally, the term will conclude with our collective staging of an installation performance piece using the Zero 1:1 objects. Each object should evoke a moment of 'katastrophe', changing the space and the physical relations between performers. Every individual act will become part of a collective chain reaction unfolding in space. After two weeks of revision, the studio will finally stage the piece and record it on video.

Art Seminars

Term 1 includes a series of 10 in depth seminars, which offer a comprehensive insight into the ‘environment’ as a relatively recent spatial practice and more generally into the conceptualisation of space in art practice. The lectures are given by Louis Philippe Van Eeckhoutte, an international art expert, curator and director of the Brussels based Dépendance gallery.

A first chapter of the seminars will focus on significant artistic practices in which architectural space plays an important role; Gregor Schneider, Thomas Demand, Pierre Huyghe, Thomas Schutte, Harald Klingelhöller, Reinhard Mucha, etc. A second part of the lectures will offer a comprehensive evolution of space within the development of art starting off in the renaissance leading up to today. This evolution will illustrate the gradual spatialisation of art. A third part of the series will zoom in on significant exhibitions in which space has been the protagonist such as Documenta, Skulptur Projekte Münster or Chambres d'Amis.

Following the experiments of Term 1, in Term 2 students will continue progressing toward their individual project. An intensive workshop at the beginning of Term 2 will guide students to select and define their specific themes of interest and conceptualise their project for an installative environment. This speculative workshop will result in: 1. a highly specific direction by which to proceed the project; 2. a selection of media to be used in the project; and 3. a project site. After the workshop, we will further develop the selected media used in Term 1, further developing our knowledge and experience. In depth tutoring will focus on developing the conceptual frameworks, formats, and media by which the projects are to be conceived, together with the process of actual production. In ADSO, there is no difference in approach between YR1 and YR2, however from Term 2 onward, the studio will guide YR1 students toward a clear project definition that includes a project–site and is attentive to the technical, material, and tectonic opportunities necessary for an interesting technical studies project. YR2 will explore a personalised project in regard to the format, outputs, and deliverables.

Unit Trip & Live Project

In 2024/25, ADS0 will travel to Belgium where we will visit numerous leading galleries, museums, and art foundations. The fieldtrip coincides with the ADS0 Live Project; a one-week workshop at the Middelheim Museum in Antwerp. During the workshop, we will work in the Atelier Van Lieshout pavilion, set amongst the unique collection of contemporary art in the Middelheim Sculpture Park. The workshop is part of the Museum's Biennial ‘Common Grounds’ and will culminate in a presentation of our ongoing work to the Museum's board of curators. This presentation will be staged in Renaet Braem's 1963 exhibition pavilion and will include our projected practices within the park; explorations of how this ‘new context’ might affect and enrichen our discourse, practice, and ongoing studio work.

In Term 3, students will focus on the production of their studio projects. YR1 students will have an emphasis on the project relation to technical studies and mature techniques of representation. YR2 students will consolidate and represent the arguments established in the design strategy document.

Tutors

Steve Salembier studied architecture at the Henry van de Velde Institute in Antwerp. He worked at Stéphane Beel architects (1998-2012) and has gradually developed an artistic practice in which he explores the narrative dimensions of space. His work mainly consists of performative installations and installative performances. In 2014 he founded Atelier Bildraum . He was awarded the Big in Belgium Award in 2015 and the Total Theater Award at the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh in 2016.

Since 2015, he has been working as artist in residence at LOD muziektheater; an internationally renowned production house for musical theatre. Since then Steve has developed several major projects within the context of this house: bildraum (2015); in between violet & green (2017); Reflector (2018); Icon (2019); babel (2020); and Umwelt(2022). All the work is currently on show internationally.

Isabel Pietri has been a key collaborator with Dyvik Kahlen, leading their UK projects since 2015. She has previously worked on major regeneration areas across London during her time at de Rijke Marsh Morgan as an Associate and core member of their residential design team. Previous experience includes work at Foster + Partners and Barkow Leibinger in Berlin, as well as construction workshops in concrete, slate and japanese joinery. Isabel graduated from the Architectural Association in London, receiving an RIBA Silver Medal Commendation and the Paul Davis + Partners award for her thesis project ‘Mies Immersion’, a mathematically derived underground archive exploring the legacy of Mies van der Rohe. Isabel previously taught ADS5 with Christopher Dyvik and Max Kahlen on the theme of Ambiguous Architecture. She has been a guest critic at Cambridge University, Liverpool University School of Architecture and the Architectural Association.

Louis-Philippe Van Eeckhoutte (1985, Roeselare, BE) is a curator and art critic. He is currently director at Dependance gallery in Brussels Belgium. In the early 2010s he lived in New York, where he worked for David Zwirner, Greenspon Gallery and the Swiss Institute. From 2010 to 2018 he was director at Office Baroque in Brussels. In 2018 he was Artistic Director of the Brussels Gallery Weekend and curator of the first edition of Generation Brussels. Since 2018, he has been a curatorial advisor for the Rediscovery section at Art Brussels. In 2020 he was co-curator of the 7th edition of Currents in Z33 in Hasselt with Melanie Deboutte. He is also the founder and editor of the online interview series Drawing Room Play.