Sensorial Urbanism: Microbes

Thursday, Mar 29, 2018

Monday, April 2 / MICROBES / Orkan Telhan (UPenn) and Esther Choi (Princeton)

This conversation considers the intersections of microbes, design and the politics of dough. Some of the questions asked include: what are the biopolitics of biohacking and the microbiome? How does a renewed understanding of the relationships between food and political economy, mechanization, land politics redefine traditional narratives of design history? And how can we rethink spatial agency if we ascribe rights of our nonhuman compadres? 
 
The intellectual ferment of this discussion will be staged around a table that brings together a large number of different types of bread. The vast "design variations" of this staple food attest not only to the different cultural settings that have shaped its various forms, but also to the crucial roles of changing microbial systems and transforming geographies of grain.

The Spring 2018 Mellon Research Forum on the Urban Environment will focus on how architecture and cities are mediated, experienced, and represented through seemingly  immaterial means. Questions include, how do theories of neurophysiology and urban form shape the way we map the inner and outer world? How do microbial landscapes determine our moods, food processes and even configurations of whole cities? And how do the ways that we smell the streets, represent the city in color, and hear urban life change the way we embody and redesign the city? Panelists will include architects, artists, scientists, designers and other scholars whose work seeks to unpack the aesthetic dimensions of immateriality in the city.
 
Organized by Evangelos Kotsioris (Architecture) and Phil Taylor (Art & Archaeology)
 
Forum events begin at 5PM and are held at the School of Architecture South Gallery.

Wednesday, February 28 / NERVES / Lan A. Li (Columbia University) and Anthony Acciavatti, Princeton Mellon Fellow

Wednesday, March 28 / COLOR / Leslie Wilson (Purchase) and Katherine Bussard (Princeton)

Monday, April 2 / MICROBES / Orkan Telhan (UPenn) and Esther Choi (Princeton)

Monday, April 16 / SCENT / Joanna Fiduccia (Reed) and Graham Burnett (Princeton)

Wednesday, April 25 / MUSIC / Willem Boning (Arup) and Emily Thompson (Princeton)