Corpora in Si(gh)te

Corpora in Si(gh)te finished its evolving process in Venice, and the organism is being dismantled from the rich Venice environment-soil and about to being replanted in some of the most prestigious exhibition venues around Europe where is was invited during Architectural Exhibition – including the Transmadiale in Belrin 2009.

The dismantle process was not without hindering obstacles, as during this final phase of deconstruction, severe floods were invading Venice and the equipment was had to be preserved, but the curator and his assistants managed to keep the stuff dry if not themselves.

If you are interested on how such a giant creature is dismantled and the images of the flood check out the gallery below:

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The Corpora website editor Peter Fuchs was discussing the future of the Corpora Project with the members of the doubleNegatives Architecture. In which direction will Corpora evolve – shall it become an ultimate tool of automated construction cyborg instructing zillions of nano-assemblers, or should it become a supplementary tool or plugin for to some CAD programs to design more ergonomic architectural bodies?

Read the interview here:

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The second phase of the maintenance went underway in the middle of October, performed by Gyula Július, the Curator. All the equipment is working fine and the Corpora system still evolves.

It seems that the 13th Architectural Biennial already had more visitors then its predecessor, manly due to the ideal weather conditions in Venice. The guards reported about a daily two thousand visitors on the weekends, and many experts showed extensive interest on the actual system of Corpora.
The floods with plagued the city in the last weeks had no effect on the Giardini area, and the freshly renovated roof of the Hungarian Pavilion endured the rain so far.

Gyula Július, Curator of the Hungarian Pavilion and one of his assistant performed the first monthly maintenance during the last week of September on the Corpora in Si(gh)te installation in Venice. They have checked waterproof connections of the electronic cables, the isolation of the rooftop cameras, their wireless connection and antennas. They have also changed the batteries for the sensors, which tend to run out quite quickly.

What makes these maintenance sessions of Corpora in Si(gh)te really special is the fact that they are the only intervention the architect supposed to perform on the system while it is running. While the algorithm calculates the sensor date for a given period of time, and forms a structure, much like a plant growing out of the seed and surfaces from the soil. As we usually change the location of the “plant” according to not expose it to the sunlight too much or the opposite, or to simply add some more water to it, so does the Corpora system is “maintained”.

Sensor cells are renewed, structure re-analyzed, carrier stems checked, some more materials (energy) added and the building ready to develop further.

[Show as slideshow]

Check out the newly added presentation videos on the history of Corpora in Si(gh)te in the Images and Videos menu.

You can also find some of the screen shots from one of the four Augmented Reality cameras attached to the neighborhooding pavilions and some images of the Corpora engine algorithm in action.

A new set of images are added to the Images and Videos page, showing the installation view of Corpora in Si(gh)te in the Hungarian Pavilion in the Giardini along with the final moments of the assembly, and also including the sensor placement locations around the building and the screenshots of the Corpora system, some taken from the super-eye perspective.
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The 11th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice opened its gates on September 14th, so we are proudly present the Corpora in Si(gh)te by doubleNegatives Architecture in the Hungarian National Pavilion in the Giardini area of the exhibition, curated by Gyula Július.

The images of the final stage of the construction, along with the pictures from the opening are available on our Images and Videos page.

The exhibition is open until the 23rd of November.

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We’re making additonal progress, both in terms of software and installation. Now the Corpora generator engine runs in an initial setup, but no real sensor data is processed as yet. Camera inputs are also working, as well as controlling our new camera using servo motors. Of course the old network cameras work as well. We can read data from the motes as well, they work quite reliably.

(Images made by Gyula Julius)

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Corpora in Si(gh)te book I is a documentation and concept book for the previous exhibition of the project Corpora in Si(gh)te, held between October 2007 and January 2008 at the Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media (YCAM). The book includes explanation drawings, comments and concept texts by the members of doubleNegatives Architecture (the authors of the project) and texts by curators.

The book is available to download from our site under in PDF under  CC-nc-by-sa license, and the texts of the  second volume, Corpora in Si(gh)te book II is being published  under the Venice Catalogue entry, on a weekly basis.