Response Essay

  Architecture is the art and science which is performed in the three-D space. Since there is no space without event, architecture can not be separated from the motion that takes place inside of it.
  Throughout the history, architecture has underwent several changes. Architecture was percieved as decorations on surfaces and architects were seen as decorators in the effect of popular culture. Surfaces became more important than it's real concern "space".
   Programatic concernes were percieved as unnecessary in the 20th century. Architecture was forced to lost its specialtiy of confronting space and action. It was more likely yo become a surface practice. The architectural monuments were percieved as decorative objects exhibited in galleries and museums. However architecture was not ideologically neutral. In my opinion architecture should not be led by ideology, but ideology should be a part of architecture.
  The spatial organization of the architect should satisfy the needs of people who shelter inside of it. Naturally there is always an interaction between the actions, movement that these people perform and the  walls that had been constructed. For that reason events become as important as the space itself.

What Is Parkour?

"If two roads open up before you, always take the most difficult one. Because you know you can travel the easy one." ―Raymond Belle

Parkour is a holistic training discipline using movement that developed from military obstacle course training. Practitioners aim to get from A to B in the most efficient way possible. (wikipedia)

This urban sport was created by David Belle and his friends in France in the 80's. David Belle was inspired by his father who was sent to a military orphanage when he was very young. He worked really hard in order to survive there and enhanced his skills with the help of his military education. He thought training was not a game but something vital which enabled him to survive and to protect the people he cared about. David realised that he wanted to be trained as his father and "le parkour" came up. It became popular in 90's with the help of media (such as movies videos...)

Parkour is a sport which developes by the interaction between human and environment. The body moves through the walls and obstacles in the urban space. It is an independent response to metropolitan life, an approach to urbanization.

Traceur Dylan Baker says "Parkour also influences one's thought processes by enhancing self-confidence and critical thinking skills that allow one to overcome everyday physical and mental obstacles".

This is a video i have found while searching. I think it could be helpful for the ones who are interested in parcour training because the motions can be seen clearly.

Since parkour has became popular worldwide there are a considerable amount of parcour athletes in Turkey.  Even there is a turkish parcour association.

 http://parkour.org.tr/ http://www.acrorun.com/

 

They encourage children for parcour training and give courses to them. They arrange activities to make parkour more common both for men and women. There are courses only for women athletes.

If I wanted to be a parcour athlete my grandmother would tell me to stop jumping over the walls and be a well behaved girl. Actually I am not really interested in physical activities that requires effort. Walking is the only activity I can do however I really respect the philosophy of parcour training and the athletes that perform amazing movements. I hope some day grandmas will like it too. 

Parkour Video

This is the parkour video I have found while searching. The motion of water that scatters through the air is interesting.

Munch/Warhol

Edvard Munch and Andy Warhol seem very different however they have clear similarities. In the exhibition there are four paintings of Munch: Scream, Eva Mudocci, Madonna and the self portrait with skeleton arm which Warhol masterfully applied some special techniques.

Conference #1

I was really pleased to attend the conference 

given by Victoria Meyers. Thus I did some research

about her work. She started with saying: 'why 

the hand?' with the image on the right. Hand is the part of our body that makes things. Humans only
understand how to design by using our body especially our hands in the process of thinking and making. 

Today we have a disembodied hand that swipes computer screnes. As the hand swipe becomes an issue in popluar culture it naturally effects architecture. On the other hand she focused the conference around architectural biogenesis (architecture that is self replicting of itself) and architectural design with the impact of robotics. As the environmet changes with the impact of global warming, architectural biogenesis becomes more important. She showed some images of her work such as buildings that self heats and glass that change colors through sunlight.

Another topic of the conference was biomorphism
which I found really interesting, so i did some research about it. Biomorphism is an art movement

which inspires from natural patterns or shapes of living organisms. I have found the image (on the right) that Victoria showed in her presentation. They have modeled the high speed trains after these birds

so it is able to combat the air cushion issue in tunnels.

She has mentioned that her designs are based onrepetition of basic geometric forms such as Pratt Pavillion (on the right). She has also 

introduced the Buddhist Retreat (the images below) which i found really inspiring. There are two rectangular buildings with lightweight frame and they are connected with a bridge. One of them is the living area and the other one is for silent meditation. The lightweight frame helps the building allow the natural daylight in. The building is outside of the country besides it is far away from ruble. In addition to that all building is decorated with wooden furniture and has zero carbon footprint which is very pleasing for Buddhist people. I think the whole building is a perfect example of  'commoditas'

The Parasite

This is the first time we were asked to design something which occupies a certain space. Firstly we determined the space where our parasite will live in the faculty building. We applied several folding operations to the paper plates to achieve volumetric elements. The parasite should be extended according to the 'minimum inventory maximum diversity principle. This is our parasite

trans[FORM]

 Firstly we had to create two planar basal elements from the cardboard. Than we were asked to make at least six different elemet types. To generate theese element types we could fold, cut or bend the basal elements. In the whole organization we had to use at least 29 elements. Theese are some  images of my groups. The purpose of the design project was creating voids.

                                                                                       I decided to use the bending technique mostly.
       I thought the curves would define better voids          then I have discovered that the curves are very
       dominating so I decided to use simpler elements        in addition to the curvy ones.








This is my final design. The project had several accidents before i took the photographs. That's why it doesn't look well