Cultural Exchange
Over the last 5 years I have been lucky enough to participate in Academic Cultural Exchange with 2 very different places.
Stepping out from the confines of Architecture into a wider experiential frame has proved to be very useful in directing any Sight .. on a particular site.
Gdansk – (Danzig) Poland
Exchange with Gdansk has made the Post Heavy Industrial landscape of Govan where I was born far more legible. To engage with the idea that its only a certain part of any countries infrastructure business community that focuses on war and destruction is useful and only heightened my belief that we chose the Industries to be good at and it would be better that we focused on more sentient pursuits than war and its mechanics as Gdansk seems to be doing.
Through Going to Gdansk I found a witness to a detonation – Clem Watson and made a film with Polish photographer - Kris Kesiak about the historic nature of Exchange between Govan + Gdansk around WW2.
It was shown on a loop in the New Hospital in Govan as part of the Art in Hospitals Programme.
Check out the video below to learn more.
First gallery - Poland
Iceland
From 2nd to 9th of June 2019 I spent a week unearthing and rebuilding a very old earth sheltered Turf Byre in Iceland. This was taught by an Icelandic farmer Helge and hosted by the museums service of Iceland.
Undertaken from heavy hands on first principles using traditional hand tools, the technique training started with the cutting of complex Turfs as Building blocks. This was Iceland’s principle construction material as timber was scarce or imported and its held in high extreme to this day. Each block of turf is multi faceted to stitch together and creates impenetrable walls worthy of dealing with the climate.
As we were moving round Reykjavik and acknowledging the extensive use of localised geothermal energy the principal Industry of Aluminium smelting became apparent and my mind turned to synthesizing a new architecture of Skeletal Aluminium and turf. There was little time to sketch it, however whilst sitting in the volcanic hot tub a myriad of ideas floated in like migratory Birds flying over.
An excellent lesson in resourcefulness thanks to Arch Net who have found a way round Brexit to keep idea exchange possible.
Second gallery - Iceland
