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Summit Expedition

Architecture, News, Research


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Jan Kattein & David Garcia’s Design Unit are exhibiting their work at the Bartlett School of Architecture Gallery.  In November 2012 Unit 3 went on an expedition to the Pyrenees, a mountain range, 150 million years old, that has weathered a radical human transformation during the last 50. Dams and industries are re-forming the landscape to feed the ever-hungry metropolises in the lowlands. Traditional herding and rural activities are disappearing, abandoning villages and farmsteads over night to contest their own fate against the slow forces of weather, erosion and decay. All the while, extreme sports and high mountain tourism are festering. Along this mountainous border, out of sight from authority and on the edge of society, a new ecology is taking hold. In tune with the local environment and responsive to the needs of the group, a movement has established itself based on the principles of fair dealing and self-organisation. Abandoned ruins, reclaimed, transform into smallholdings; micro-industries rely on the mutual exchange of goods and services ensuring self-sufficiency. Communal activities generate the local infrastructure necessary for a civilized society while the internet provides a platform for global solidarity and skills exchange. 14 portable shelters made in the Bartlett workshop have served as tools for the study the climatic-, social-, geological- and ecological parameters of the site and also provided overnight accommodation during the expedition. The exhibition shows work by Ginny Chau, Melanie Cheng, Nicolas Chung, Deniz Varol, Max Friedlander, Karen Hu, Yolanda Heng In Leung, Martyna Marciniak, Isabel Ogden, Andra Tuna, Chengqi Wan, Henrietta Watkins, Vivian Wong, Tracey Xiao.

 

Lecture at Utopie und Experiment Conference

Research, Stage Design


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Jan Kattein and Anna Malunat will lecture at the Utopie und Expirment conference at the European Center for the Arts Hellerau in Dresden, Germany on 13. September 2011. The lecture entitled Performance Environments presents 3 collaborative projects where space, acting and composition have merged into a common choreography.

Bartlett Show opening

Architecture, Research


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Unit 3, run by Jan Kattein and David Garcia is exhibiting at the Bartfest, one of the most important architecture events in London. 10.000 people are expected to visit the galleries of the Slade School of Art between 01 07 11 and 09 07 11. Click here for a link to the Bartlett website.