HK (Howard Kim): The focus of the LAX Studio was exploring the territory in and around LAX airport. You described LAX airport as, “… a hyper-dynamic global hub immersed in an equally complex and rich local condition.” What do you mean by this? And what were the main ideas underlying the LAX Studio?

JJ (Jason Johnson): In the early 1970’s the British architectural critic Reyner Banham wrote an extraordinary book on Los Angeles called, The Architecture of Four Ecologies. He described the LA freeways as “Autotopias” that were on par with the boulevards of Paris and Rome. The beach towns were named “Surfurbias” where sun, sand and surf were held to be the “ultimate and transcendental values.” Banham found poetry in a place many found incomprehensible. A few years after writing the book he was asked to tape a BBC documentary film focused on LA. It begins with him sliding into this enormous rental car at LAX airport. As he drives off he turns on the car stereo and is greeted with an automated female voice that says: “Welcome to Los Angeles, City of the Future.” I have always found this scene inspiring. Even today, Los Angeles continues to be a place of immense interest for designers. It fundamentally breaks the rules of everything your education tells you a city should be: a sprawling technological beast, decentralized, wasteful, messy, ad hoc, informal, etc. I think it is both shocking and thrilling for architecture students to experience this first hand. Initially it is a kind of exotic and saturated experience—the sun, the palm trees, the movie stars, the mobility and the freedom. Banham called this the “plastic fluorescent spectacle.” Inevitably though, perhaps while anxiously sitting in a traffic jam on the 405, the euphoria begins to wear off. The tension between utopia and dystopia becomes palpable. This is why LA is so fascinating to visit and study. It provides a loaded context for exploring contemporary social, cultural and ecological trends, as well as their countless paradoxes. I think these conditions extend beyond LA and are applicable to many global situations. LAX airport and its surroundings have a kind of unstoppable animalistic energy: the sheer scale and complexity, the feeling of being on the edge between the US, Latin America and Asia, the intertwining of people, planes, cars, buses, freight, helicopters, and of course, on a clear morning you can see the Pacific ocean on one side, and the Hollywood sign on the other. This is why I called it a hyper-dynamic global hub. But it is when you begin to deconstruct or delaminate LAX that things get interesting. I ask students many questions like: Where did all these people come from, what are they connected to, and where are they going? Where does LAX get all this energy? Where is it getting all this water? How can architecture engage this situation in any significant way? The students focused their energies on a parking structure between LAX’s domestic and international terminals. I think their projects tried to tap into the complexity I have been describing: one student proposed a refugee camp; another proposal was an immigration resort powered by PV arrays; we had a hostel-campground-energy farm; and another was a kind of hedonistic spa for jet setting global nomads. Every project tried to harvest flows of sun, water or wind into something productive and social. The studio was really about challenging the students to cultivate meaningful cultural conditions in a territory of rapid flux. The work was quite intense, critical and forward thinking. I think Reyner Banham would have been intrigued with these projects.

HK: Your teaching methodology seems to provoke students to produce highly experimental work. Why is design experimentation important? How was the LAX Studio structured to encourage this?

JJ: I have always understood design to be an inherently creative and experimental practice. There is an ethic to continuously questioning and evolving the world around us. You must believe you can do things better–whether it be more sustainable, more efficient, more intellectually engaging. Today’s best designers are embracing the intricacy of these problems and are actively challenging the status quo. We know that the US—with its sprawling patterns of settlement and dependence on oil—is a major contributor to global warming, among other evils. So it is obvious that we have an immense amount of work to do. I think as a teacher—regardless of how cynical the world might be around us—I have to be optimistic. My challenge is to instill this optimism in my students. To this end, I think the kind of experimentation I encourage stresses modes of critical, creative and technical thinking, as well as varying degrees of risk-taking and innovation. These are the fundamental modes of practice I attempt to instill in my students, and I can only hope that these values will yield more thoughtful, dynamic and critical designers.

Jean-Paul Sartre wrote that everything in LA was “schizo-genetically reproduced” and moving “forward like modern armies”. How could you not be experimental in this context? The studio sought to raise more questions than it answered. Many students found this approach to be frustrating, while others found this open-endedness to be exciting and provoking. When you work in modes that are iterative and open to feedback you have to design and think in a more networked way, and perhaps be more strategic. You also have to be open to the possibility that you might enter intellectual, creative or technical terrain that is unknown. This is what being in design school is all about. I continue to learn new things from my students each semester, and I hope they enjoy the intensity.

HK: The U.Va. School of Architecture has a strong focus in trying to blur the boundaries between architecture and landscape architecture, and also in sustainable design. How did the LAX Studio fit into these values?

JJ: I think the whole idea of what an architect “is” or “does” is changing. Many architects are increasingly becoming marginalized because of their unwillingness or inability to cross disciplinary boundaries, or to engage wider fields of inquiry, production and collaboration. People are beginning to get a sense that the era of architects producing mere “buildings” is slowly coming to an end. What’s emerging is a multi-disciplinary field that is being asked to consider entire social, cultural, technological and ecological networks. I think one of today’s big challenges is to shift architecture’s modus operandi away from inert, stable and close-looped working models, towards kinetic, dynamic, open-looped systems thinking. It is really about developing an intuition for how matter, energy and geometry can not only co-exist, but can co-evolve over time. Perhaps this is why I find landscape architecture—and its obsession with time cycles and succession—so fascinating. There is clearly an immense amount to learn from other disciplines that have more dynamic mind-sets. It is also important to recognize that each discipline has its own unique array of theories, techniques and modes of representation–all with their own limits and potentials. For instance, landscape architecture is a distinct discipline with unique parameters, material logics and performance standards. While I am not convinced that merging disciplines—like into an alloy—is the best approach, I absolutely believe in the value of promiscuous interchange and collaboration. In my mind the LAX studio was really a hybrid landscape-urbanism-architecture-ecology studio. The students were asked to explore the world through the lens of many overlapping fields. At the final review we brought this eccentric mix of people together to talk about systems, flows and interconnections. In the end, the common concern for all these landscape-urbanism-architecture—ecologists was the city. How do we continue to evolve the project of the American city—adding new layers and densities, increasing connections and bio-diversities? How do we make our cities vital, healthy and productive places? I was thrilled that these were the important questions raised by the studio.

Before the studio traveled to Los Angeles I asked Bill Morrish to give us a crash course in southern California infrastructure. He was instrumental in helping us understand the key issues. His talk was brilliant at prompting the students to make connections between big scale systems to the small scale—like linking rivers and aqueducts to the ice cubes in your lemonade. He pulled the layers apart and made them legible, almost poetic. I should also mention that during our trip to LA we visited early California modernist projects by architects like Irving Gill, Rudolf Schindler, and Charles and Ray Eames. I think the only way to really understand the work of contemporary modernists—people such as Frank Gehry, Morphosis, Eric Owen Moss or Julie Eizenberg—is to understand the lineage. Although these designers are experimental—they are also clearly referencing and building upon their predecessors. There is an immense amount to learn from these people, as well as from the history of Los Angeles and its infrastructure.

HK: In the LAX Studio, you stressed the importance of computer modeling as well as physical model making and hand drawing (sketching/diagramming) to explore and express ideas. What role do these different methods of design play in your studio?

JJ: In my design studios I challenge students to push whatever technology or process they are using to its limit. I find that you can learn an immense amount about a design problem by crossing back and forth between techniques and technologies, and between physical and digital models. The cross-pollination is productive. One technique or software might be excellent for exploring complex geometries and spatial relationships, while another might allow you to simulate more complex material qualities, dynamic behaviors and interactions. That being said, I continue to believe that building physical models help students to develop an intuition about material logics and assemblies that the computer cannot currently replicate. It is hard to feel or comprehend a range of tension or compression forces, or weight, in a typical computer model. Regardless, I want to cultivate designers that can move fluidly between these modes and make intelligent decisions along the way. It is important to note that some of my colleagues continue to argue that computers are merely another “tool” like a stick of charcoal or a T-square. I also tend to hear the same people divide things up into “analog vs. digital” or “hand vs. computer.” At this point in time I find these categorizations irrelevant. They reveal a fundamental misunderstanding of how truly revolutionary computers are, and how omnipresent they will soon be. Whether we like it or not, the next generation of designers will certainly not have these hang-ups. As new technologies for designing, communicating and fabrication evolve, their creative, technical and social capacities tend to increase. I think this is a very positive thing for all of us.

HK: Everyday, we depend more and more on technology. (e.g. It’s now hard to imagine this world without the Internet although it is a fairly new technology.) What does technology mean to you in architecture? Do you consider it as an optional solution to certain problems, or as an absolute necessity in our life?

JJ: I think that the physiological space of my own generation – including its particular sense of vision, touch, smell, sound and movement—has been profoundly affected by new computational technologies and networks. For example, patterns of urban living are routinely intermeshed and controlled by artificially intelligent systems. This has become second-nature to my generation. What is emerging is a new sensibility, or perhaps, a new sensitivity to the potential of cybernetic systems to coexist with us. We have seen successive generations of architects being affected by similar ideas to varying degrees. In the 1960’s we had groups like Archigram that were spellbound with techno-gadgetry, while people like Constant Nieuwenhuys or Super Studio took a more critical position to technology and globalization. Buckminster Fuller often gets a bad rap as the techno-architect, but I happen to believe his ideas were more profound than he gets credit for. I think that many young architects today—and I am certainly implicated in this—continue to view technological advances with a kind of naive fetishistic optimism. As much as I bash the classicists, I have come to understand that fanaticism with the future is not necessarily on a higher moral plateau than romanticism of the past. I am reminded of

Hegel’s paradox: “Man learns from history that man learns nothing from history.” As such, our generation continues to place hope in the development of future technologies to repair the damage done by our previous generation’s ill-conceived technologies, just as they placed hope in new technologies to repair the damage done by their previous generation’s ill-conceived technologies, and so on and so forth. Will any of this make the world a more peaceful, more equitable, or a cleaner place? Well, when you look back in time, you begin to understand that social, cultural and ecological progress simply does not go hand-in-hand with technological progress. It seems to take painfully long for synthesis to occur at these more essential levels. Nevertheless, the closer we can move our new technologies—including our cities, buildings and landscapes—towards more responsive, self-regulating and energy interdependent models, the better off we will be. As I suggested earlier, our very notion of “city” is now fundamentally intermeshed with network logics. Control systems, communication and infrastructural networks: each now plays an integral part in the organizational dynamics of city life. Therefore, technology is not so much an absolute necessity, nor is it optional. It has fundamentally become an integral part of our cosmopolitan nervous system whether we like it or not.

HK: The syllabus for your research seminar describes Robotic Ecologies as “…promiscuous new environments brought forth by the rapid release of advanced computation into the physical realm.” Would you discuss your interest in integrating robotics into architecture?

JJ: My Princeton thesis explored self-replicating architectural machines at a very abstract level. What if a building could not only manufacture itself, but could also maintain, repair, dismantle and then recycle itself? And what if there were swarms of these things working in tandem, and they all collected their own energy? It all sounds pretty sci-fi–but the research really opened my eyes to emerging fields where my questions seemed almost commonplace–artificial intelligence, robotics and the material sciences. I also quickly became intrigued with the implications of computer-controlled systems like rapid prototyping and various automation technologies. My partner Nataly Gattegno and I have also been experimenting with some of these ideas in our design office. Several of our recent design competition entries have tried to understand the potential of these ideas at a range of scales and situations. So the seminar is really an extension of my early research and the ideas emerging from Future Cities Lab, perhaps with a little more focus. This year in the seminar we are exploring how various physical structures and skins might integrate robotic systems. We are extremely interested in understanding how to instill these material assemblies with the instinct to respond to their environments, to adapt and perhaps learn from its actions, and the actions of its neighbors. Imagine entire building assemblies that react and move in continuous negotiation with the energy dynamics and cycles of their surroundings. Imagine, as you move through an environment, thousands of tiny sensors tracking your motion trajectory through a space and adapting its scale, shape, texture, light, sound, heat, etc. These responses could be quite dramatic—as in an active structural or shape change; very subtle—as in a material or skin change or a hybrid of the two. The seminar is currently experimenting with standard components like microcontrollers, IR sensors and servo motors—and we are integrating them into pretty sophisticated material and mechanical assemblies. Programming and software integration has been a real challenge, but it is beginning to produce a level of interactivity and intelligence that even I find astonishing. The students participating in the seminar this year have been especially energetic and skilled, and have inspired me to take the research to the next level. This is really just the beginning. In future iterations of the seminar I would like to investigate technologies that are substantially smaller, lighter, demand less power and have more precise control. Materials such as shape memory alloys have immense potential to move us beyond mechanistic assemblies to systems that are more materially based. These will hopefully allow generative form-finding and energy-seeking logics to be incorporated directly into architectural material assemblies and textiles. I am really at the beginning of this research project and I am constantly surprised by the fascinating territories that are opening up.

JJ: Howard, I would love to turn the tables a little bit and ask you a question. You will be graduating in a few weeks with a Bachelor of Science in Architecture. What are your impressions about your design education? You have certainly been exposed to a variety of ideas and engaged a pretty wide body of techniques from drawing, modeling, scripting, programming, digital modeling, animation, fabrication and simulation – how do you see yourself synthesizing this range of experiences as you move into the future?

HK: As you said, my education at U.Va. exposed me to a diverse range of techniques and methods in approaching design. I mostly used my pencil and x-acto blades starting from Lessons in Making until the end of my first year studios. I began to explore computer modeling and fabrication during my second year, but it really wasn’t until I participated in the LAX Studio or other seminars such as Infolab, Robotic Ecologies, and Emergent Practices, that I was able to experiment with the digital world at an entirely new level. I continue to sketch out my ideas and to build physical models. However, I generally find myself working extensively in the digital realm, because it’s so efficient, accurate and flexible. I believe that it is this diversity that allows me to work through various design problems effectively. I plan to keep all these ideas and techniques with me as I graduate. I will also hopefully continue to generate innovative design work that will expand the boundaries of architecture. In the future I wish to participate in redefining what architecture is, and what it could be.

Notes: The LAX Studio took place during the Fall semester of 2006 at the University of Virginia. Professor Johnson would like to thank all of the undergraduate Arch 401 students who participated in the studio: Hank Byron, Ama Cobbina, Seth Edwards, Paul Fromm, Billy Glick, Karey Helms, Kathryn Hilton, Owen Howlett, Howard Kim, Alex Kong, Dolores O’Connor and Matthew Robisch. Thanks also to Eric Owen Moss and Julie Eizenberg for tours of their LA design studios, and to the numerous faculty who participated in design reviews. The trip was also financially supported by the U.Va. Deparment of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, chaired by Prof. William Sherman. Work from the LAX Studio will be published at: www.future-cities-lab.net.

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