Convertible City: March 2011

Title: Field of Informality: Tirana

Lecturers: Sarah Calburn/Dustin Tusnovics

Program: Formal/Informal Tirana Mapping

Students: 4th year
Time: 2 weeks
Location: POLIS Uni/Tirana
Modality: individual elaborations

This studio seeks to understand, explore and expand the limits and potentials contained within the terms 'formal' and 'informal' as they apply to a cross section of Tirana.

We understand these terms to operate across a range of scales and qualities: they are mental, social, economic, political, architectural, urban and cultural, and they operate here both historically and contemporaneously.

Informal thinking (however it comes into being) ranges from the lateral, imaginative and radical to the outright illegal. Formal thinking ranges from an idealised rationality of highest sophistication and order to outright oppression.

We believe that the architect needs to move, continuously, between these two ranges of thought.

Could Tirana be seen as a perfect example of both these states of thought and action?

The studio will operate in 2 parts:

Week 1:

Students will critically map a strip of the city, from edge to edge, from the outskirts towards the airport across the Kombinat area to the centre across the 'valley of colours' to the northern landscape of the housing complexes, crossing all urban densities, scales and situations.

This critical mapping aims to expose and expand all techniques that may fall within the formal - informal continuum.

Mapping techniques will be developed from sketch into 3 dimensions to form a final 'map-strip' sculpture.

Mapping/formal languages will each develop in response to qualities mapped and expressions sought.

Week 2:

Identified formal/informal techniques will be developed into expanded narratives for positive architectural action. Students will make architectural interventions into their mapped areas using these developed conceptual bases.

Projects will be presented in 3D-models, and linked, again, to form a strip. Project scales will vary depending on the aims.

All work will be undertaken as individual projects.

Detailed Program:

Week 1:

Day 1:

Morning:

Lecture by D and S on global informalities,

Strip areas handed out to student pairs.

Readings handed out.

Straight onto bus:

Afternoon: Tour Guides: 'Describe your City' Bus trip across the strip, (lunch along the way) students to act in turn as tour guides to their parts (need microphone), describing the areas we are passing through, and ad libbing on the formal/informal conditions we are passing through.

Day 2:

Morning:

Lecture: by D and S on mapping

Work: drawing in studio, starting to map, draw, think, etc

Afternoon: crits and discussion of formal/informal conditions found so far: discussion of relevant mapping languages

Day 3:

Morning: work: expansion of formal/informal conditions from 2D into 3D mapping languages

Afternoon: crits and discussion: refinement of 3D languages alongside conceptual frameworks

Day 4:

All day work, informal crits for those who need them in afternoon

Day 5:

Morning: work and final assembly of strip

Afternoon: presentation of 3D strip:

Need to present concise conceptual outcomes taking account of readings.

Intermediate evaluation of each pair, based on the work of first week.

Weekend task: to think about a possible intervention in terms of mapping concept

Week 2:

Day 1:

Morning: present intervention idea based on expanded mapping narrative

Afternoon: work

Day 2:

Morning: work, 2D

Afternoon: work, informal crits

Day 3:

Morning: work into 3D

Afternoon: group crit session, formal

Day 4:

All day work, model making, informal crits

Day 5:

Morning: assemble model strip for final exhibition (including all material!!!!!)

Afternoon: Final Presentation to jury

some definitions of informality:

informal/ɪnˈfɔːml/_

▶adjective

1 relaxed and unofficial; not formal.

2 of or denoting the grammatical structures, vocabulary, and idiom suitable to everyday language and conversation rather than to official or formal contexts.

Definitions of informality on the Web:

a manner that does not take forms and ceremonies seriously
ease: freedom from constraint or embarrassment; "I am never at ease with strangers"
wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
The condition of being informal
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/informality

Adjective

informal (comparative more informal, superlative most informal)