Architecture as Narrative

Catalog description

In this course, students explore the relationships between architecture and narrative-based cultural expressions such as film, novels and even games, analyzing current developments from a critical perspective. As part of their study, students will focus on space as medium for storytelling. The course is divided in two parts in order to progress from homo spectator to homo faber. In the first half students develop their theoretical framework through lectures, group discussions and workshops on different sources that may include films such as Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner and Japanese Studio Ghilbi’s Spirited Away, architectural work from Rem Koolhaas and Toyo Ito, and cyberpunk texts from William Gibson, Lebbeus Woods, and others. Students’ newly-acquired conceptual background is summarized in a midterm essay. In the second part of the course, students apply their skills on a series of short projects for Manhattan, located at the intersection between architecture and narrative. For the production of their projects, students are expected to bring to the class their own set of interests and abilities —ranging, for example, from music to computer gaming, or from academic research to Internet literacy.