2017F_Italian Studies Program_Erel Studio

Posted by Main Editor on Wednesday, February 12, 2020 · Leave a Comment

Vertical Arch Design Studio, Italy

Generative Excavations: Analysis Design Studio, Rome 2017

Faculty: Yael Erel

“Now let us, by a flight of imagination, suppose that Rome is not a human habitation but a psychical entity with a similarly long and copious past— an entity, that is to say, in which nothing that has once come into existence will have passed away and all the earlier phases of development continue to exist alongside the latest one…” (Sigmund Freud Civilization and its discontents 1927).

Inspired by Freud’s reading of Rome as layered entity we begin excavating histories imbedded within it. Each student team was given a square fragment of the Nolli Map of Rome with an imbedded architectural “gem”. Through deep observation, dissection and analysis in multiple scales the students proposed a thesis revealing the logics embedded in the artifact and its zeitgeist; uncovering the spirit of the time it was written through the spirit of our time, when it is read. Diane Lewis words “History is never plausible, fiction must be” (Open City – Existential Urbanism) guided us to precisely project our poetic imagination while grounded in analysis. The ambition of this project is to turn the reading of an architectural gem into writing, taking the analysis to its next generative step. An architectural reading becomes a key to unlock a new beginning.