Workshop A Hybrid Soundscape with Philip Beesley: Full scholarships
Workshop Second Land: a ground veiling installation led by Philip Beesley at Domaine de Boisbuchet, 2019, © Martina Orska
The Living Architecture Systems Group (LASG) and the Domaine de Boisbuchet are pleased to announce a unique opportunity for architecture, art and design students around the globe. Through cooperation with the LASG and Boisbuchet, we have arranged a small fund to allow a select group of students to participate in Philip Beesley, Rob Gorbet and the LASG’s workshop: A Hybrid Soundscape, August 8-14, 2021. Stipends awarded by the LASG will cover full registration and accommodation fees for a small group of students.
How to apply:
Interested students should provide a sample of their work and a brief cover letter indicating interest to Guillermo Gil Fernández guillermo.gil@boisbuchet.org, copying Ellie Hayden ehayden@lasg.ca, by July 11, 2021. To help guide the selection of students, we would like understand why this workshop is of interest to you and how this might benefit your own development. This program seeks to support students who would otherwise not have the means to support their participation in this workshop. We kindly ask that only students in need of this support apply. We will contact accepted applicants by July 13.
The Workshop – A Hybrid Soundscape – August 8 – 14, 2021
In a human-made environment that we have equipped completely with appliances, our organic antennas are losing their abilities to detect, filter, and orient information. Staying outdoors in nature has become an exception and when we escape the overflow of information from our fellow humans, the outdoors are taking effects like a massage, shower, or nap. We certainly need both, the natural and the artificial parts of our world. But how can the two spheres approach each other? What can we learn from natural patterns and how can we, in reverse, introduce artificial structures to nature? This workshop is about sound, human-made and natural sound. We’ll experiment in order to create a hybrid soundscape in an installation that achieves to bridge nature’s orchestra with our artificially created sounds and tones. It’s not about imitating but about listening, understanding and answering. We are going to develop a new acoustic situation, operated with the support of technical and digital devices and installed at the interface of Boisbuchet’s unique architecture and nature.
The LASG is preparing geometric scaffold, simple electronics, low-voltage amplification, sensors and control kits that we’ll bring to furnish the students, in order to make scaffold-supported electroacoustic devices with some connections that permit fields of sound, light and very simple motion. Low-voltage battery packs will be included to allow portability, so that the work can be located outdoors, weather permitting. An introductory day would use kits, and then two days of exploration would proceed, with the remaining time constructing parts of a collective installation and a performance completing the session. Students in the workshop will also contribute to an open-access publication documenting the work. For more information, please visit: https://www.boisbuchet.org/workshop/a-hybrid-soundscape/
Living Architecture Systems Group
Led by Philip Beesley and Rob Gorbet from the University of Waterloo, the Living Architecture Systems Group brings together researchers and industry partners in a multidisciplinary research cluster dedicated to developing built environments with qualities that come close to life— environments that can move, respond, and learn, with metabolisms that can exchange and renew their environments, and which are adaptive and empathic towards their inhabitants. Supported by Waterloo, Canada’s Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and contributions from numerous partners, LAS is focused on developing innovative technologies, new critical aesthetics, and integrative design working methods, helping equip a new generation of designers with critical next-generation skills and critical perspectives for working with complex environments. https://livingarchitecturesystems.com/
Domaine de Boisbuchet
Boisbuchet was the dream of a design amateur and expert: Alexander von Vegesack, founding director of the Vitra Design Museum. He wanted a place where design meets education, in a large sense. Some 30 years ago, he bought the 150 hectares Domaine de Boisbuchet. Since then, professionals and students come every year to experience how internationally successful professionals structure their work, and how they approach design problems. Every year, we invite the most inspiring architects & designers from all over the world, to give a week-long workshop at the Domaine de Boisbuchet in South-West France. Every tutor takes into account the inspiring natural environment, and crafts a theme for participants to build upon. Every single workshop is a unique hands-on experience, with the guarantee of learning by doing with materials and tools provided by Boisbuchet. Throughout the week, participants get insight on the process & techniques of top designers, and have the opportunity to connect with like-minded, passionate people. https://www.boisbuchet.org/