Problems of Scale and Translation A Design Project in 8 Acts
Samantha Spurr, UNSW, Sydney
Take a map of the city that you are in and wrap it around a stone. Wrap it roughly in any way that you like, pressing the folds till they are crisp and distinct. Unfold the map, release the stone, and the project begins.
1. Metropolis – The Map
Materials: Watercolour paper (300gsm 560x760), 7H pencil, sharpener, scale ruler.
Action: Walk the fold, take the map with you, walk it anyway you like but walk it, letting time pass for several hours.
Procedure: Transfer the folded city map to the watercolour paper using the 7H pencil, keeping it sharp at all times. This becomes ‘the map’. Work with precision. Endeavour to retain the scale of the map.
Notate the walk using the 7H pencil onto the map, using any technique that you choose.
2. Ecologies – The Diagram
Materials: the Map, 6H pencil, sharpener, scale ruler.
Action: Walk the fold, take the map with you, walk a different fold this time but walk it, letting time pass for at least an hour.
Procedure: Notate the walk with the 6H pencil using any technique that you choose. Consider the diagram being produced between the lines that you are making and the experiences you are accumulating. Consider the shifting relations across those different scales. Think about the smells, the colours and the sounds that you encountered and how they might translate onto the new map.
3. Neighbourhoods – The Sketch
Materials: The Map, 5H pencil, sharpener, scale ruler.
Action: Walk the fold, take the map with you, walk a different fold this time but walk it, letting time pass for at least an hour.
Procedure: Notate the walk with the 5H pencil onto the map, using any technique that you choose. Consider more carefully the lines that you are making; the changes in pressure from the weight of your arm or hand, the differences in thickness or punctuations and staccato moments that could relate to your experiences in the city.
4. Intensities – The Cast
Materials: The map, 4H pencil, coloured liquid (this could be watercolour, ink, tea etc. used as a light wash).
Action: Reflect on the drawing and define a moment of intensity that shimmers with possibility. You may have visited this space on the map or it may have emerged virtually through the drawing. You should be able to walk the furthest length of this space in 10-20 minutes. Go to the chosen space and spend some time there in attentive observation and analysis; sketch, take photographs, make notes of what you see.
Procedure: Articulate this space on your drawing using a very, very light wash of liquid. Notate the walk entering and exiting this space as well as your perambulations with the 4H pencil, using any technique that you choose. Consider what makes certain places distinct from others, how boundaries are both patent and amorphous, how environments entice and repulse through diverse and multiple forms of engagement.
5. Miniatures - The Model
Materials: The map, 3H pencil, sharpener, scale ruler, visual diary/sketch book.
Action: Return to the space that you have articulated on the drawing, entering and exiting using a different route/fold. Go to the chosen space and spend some time there in attentive observation and analysis; sketch, take photographs, make notes of what you see. Collect a minimum of ten objects from within the space that fit in your pocket.
Procedure: Notate your perambulations in the space with the 3H pencil, using any technique that you choose. Notate where each object was found and their relation to each other and other key elements. Using a visual diary or sketchbook consider the collected objects thoughtfully, as separate entities and aggregate collectivities. Iterate endlessly. Reconsider them in multiple scales through sketches, from insect size, to elephant size, to building size. Play.
6. Interiorities – The Document(ation)
Materials: The map, 2H pencil (option mechanical), sharpener, scale ruler, three A3 cartridge papers.
Action: Do not walk the map.
Procedure: Distil the iterative sequence of spaces developed previously to a single form. Draft it with care and precision to the scale of 1:20 using the 2H pencil; from above, from within and from outside. Examine its possibilities for inhabitation, for event. Examine it again for different inhabitations, multiple events. Draw a scaled figure in action into the elevation and the section. Change the action and redraw.
Draw the plan onto your map over the moment of intensity articulated by the wash of liquid. Consider thoughtfully the scale of the plan, to the scale of the map.
7. Volumes - The Space
Materials: The map, HB pencil (option mechanical), sharpener, scale ruler, butcher's paper/ tracing paper, boxboard, scalpel/blade, glue.
Action: Return to the chosen space and spend some time there in attentive observation and analysis sketching the new spaces into this environment.
Procedure: From the drafted drawings of the space examine the negative spaces and the volumes formed between lines. Explore this using butcher's paper/tracing paper over the drawings. Iterate. Reconsider the lines. Redraw. Create a model from boxboard based on the new drawings. Be precise with your blade and the glue. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Change scales. Repeat.
Redraw the new plan onto your map over the moment of intensity articulated by the wash of liquid. Consider thoughtfully the scale of the plan to the scale of the map.
8. Bodies – The Project
Materials: The map, B pencil (option mechanical), sharpener, scale ruler, liquid wash, model materials of choice, scalpel/blade, glue.
Procedure: Distil iterations to a single form. Remake the model using alternative materials of your choice. Scale this model to the map. Consider how the model integrates into the ground plane-paper of the map – floating, cutting into, carving into, mirroring. Sketch out the possibilities for different kinds of inhabitation in these spaces. Sketch out the possibilities of different kinds of
movement in these spaces. Remake the model at the ground plane. Remake it again. Remake it better. Remake it until it is as real to you as the city outside your door.
Clarify and rework the drawing with assiduous additions of the B pencil. Clarify and rework the drawing with restrained additions of the liquid wash.
Action: Lay the map on the ground and affix the model to its plan as notated in the moment of intensity. Photograph the map from above as if you were momentarily hovering above the city like a bird. Keep this image to remind you of the city that you were in.
