All Things Visual: The University of Chicago Visual Resources Center

The Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) has received two major grants from the NEA and Getty Foundation that will be used to create the SCI-Arc Digital Lecture Archive.

This free web archive will contain more than 1,000 hours of key architectural and design lectures and symposia from 1974 to the present that will be accessible online, via phone applications, e-readers, and other new media channels… The SCI-Arc Digital Lecture Archive will provide access to never before seen footage of some of the most influential leaders in architecture and design, including Frank O. Gehry, Zaha Hadid, David Hockney, Rem Koolhaas, John Lautner, Thom Mayne, Eric Owen Moss, Kazuyo Sejima, and many more… Scheduled to be launched in 2012—coinciding with SCI-Arc’s 40th anniversary—the SCI-Arc Digital Lecture Archive will feature a sophisticated search engine that will allow access to both entire lectures as well as specific segments of each lecture, placing the school’s significant archive at one’s fingertips.

Via Archinet.

The current exhibition at the Graham Foundation, Anne Tyng: Inhabiting Geometry, explores the work of one of the first women to ever receive a fellowship from the Foundation, as well as one of the first women to receive a Masters of Architecture from Harvard University.

This exhibition presents the work of the visionary architect and theorist Anne Tyng. Since the 1950s, when she worked closely with Louis I. Kahn and independently pioneered habitable space-frame architecture, Tyng has applied natural and numeric systems to built forms on all scales, from urban plans to domestic spaces.

The exhibition will be on view in Chicago until June 18, 2011 at the Graham Foundation.

Lantern slides that belonged to the University of Chicago Visual Resources Center were donated to Theaster Gates’ Dorchester Project, which was featured in a recent New York Times article.

Mr. Gates has combined a former candy store, a single-family house and a duplex across the street into a site of artistic and community change for a neighborhood that has suffered years of blight and cultural neglect. The installation is an entry in a growing art movement to create “hybridized” arts spaces that serve multiple functions, taking inspiration from installations in Houston and Los Angeles, as well as in Chicago’s Woodlawn neighborhood in a community center called the Experimental Station.

During the month of April an installation by Chicago architect Alex Lehnerer and his Department of Urban Speculation will be the featured UBS 12×12 exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art. This work, called Roadside Attractions,

looks at such ubiquitous and abundantly available urban elements, or “attractions” that are perpendicular to the road: doors, roofs, windows, lobbies, stairs, or walls. The exhibition examines how these can become protagonists, which, if exaggerated, over-extended, or misused, can form the urban between structure and situation.

The architect’s Department of Urban Speculation, founded in 2009,

was set up to create a link between Lehnerer’s work as practicing architect and urban designer and his academic role in the same fields.

Alex Lehnerer will give a free Artist Talk in conjunction with the exhibition on Tuesday, April 12th at 6pm. The “First Friday,” April 1st, marks the unofficial opening of the show. UBS 12 x 12 is a program at the MCA designed to feature new work by new artists. An archive of past exhibitions is available here.

The project Montada seeks the preservation and revitalization of traditional architecture… in the Maghreb by involving local communities, especially children. Toward that goal, it is developing online games that allow children from 6 to 11 years old to discover the basic principles of a traditional architecture while developing their creativity.

…A new game acts as a virtual workshop that allows children to explore geometric elements and ornaments in the homes of Sale and Marrakech, in Morocco. After finishing, children can print out their results as postcards.

Via Archnet News.

The new Wright Guide, developed by Azara Apps and adapted from William Allin Storrer’s The Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright, offers descriptions and a photograph of each of the built works by Frank Lloyd Wright. Building descriptions link to other nearby architecture as well as to directions from the user’s current location. Buildings may be searched through the index or by browsing location or date. Users can even keep track of which buildings they’ve visited in the application.

The app is $9.99 and compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad with iOS 3.0 or later. It is available from the iTunes store.

Via Deep Focus.

Join your colleagues on Saturday, October 23rd for a day of discussions, lectures, tours, screenings, and exhibitions in celebration of the 32nd annual Humanities Day at the University of Chicago. All programs are free and open to the public. The Department of Art History’s Katherine Taylor will be giving her lecture Robie House, 100 Years New during session three at Breasted Hall, at 3:30pm on Saturday. See the online program for full schedule details and additional information, and go here to register.

The New York Times recently published an article about 3-D printing technology and its impact on several industries, including design and architecture.  3-D printing technology may eventually advance from the creation of architectural models to the construction of actual buildings:

A California start-up is even working on building houses. Its printer, which would fit on a tractor-trailer, would use patterns delivered by computer, squirt out layers of special concrete and build entire walls that could be connected to form the basis of a house.

For a demonstration of the kinds of products manufactured with this technology see the video included in the NYT story.

The Aga Khan Award for Architecture was established in 1977 to enhance the understanding and appreciation of Islamic culture as expressed through architecture. The 19 nominees for the 11th cycle have been announced. The nominees, which include a textile factory in Turkey, a school built on a bridge in China and a wetlands project in Saudi Arabia, will be competing for the prestigious award. Visit the Award’s website for more information about the 19 nominees. You can also download high resolution images of each nominated building.

After finals are complete, you might consider taking a break and some inspiration from these couch cushion architects (critiqued by authors of the BUILDblog).

A brilliant synergy between the weighted foundation and the light tensile structure, this project impressed us with its attenuation of structure and bright interior spaces. The courtyard and formal entry are also well thought-out and provide a clear means of way-finding. Grade A+