StudioBLEAK, which promotes "Conscious Architecture", has announced the results of the Climate of Dissent - Protest Design Challenge. The architects were asked to act as eco-activists and "design" protests dedicated to the problem of global warming. The terms of reference did not stipulate the budget, terms of execution and parameters of the site.
“The current economic and political forces are in direct confrontation with solving the problem of climate change,” the organizers of the competition say. "By keeping politicians, investors and business leaders - whose direct work is destroying the climate system - aside, protests can save the planet from disaster." For a protest to be effective, it must be well planned. And this is its similarity to the "act of architecture", preparation for which takes into account many details, the interaction of all elements and the movement of people.
A jury of "creative activists", architects and educators selected three winners and one honorable mention laureate.
First place
Frozen Relic: Arctic Protest / ScanLAB (UK)
Frozen Relic: Arctic Dissent / ScanLAB
In 2013 the team
ScanLAB has researched breakaway ice floes in the Arctic using precise 3D scanning technology. The work was carried out aboard the icebreaker The Arctic Sunrise in cooperation with Greenpeace and the University of Cambridge. During two Arctic expeditions, the team documented data on 26 fragments drifting in the Fram Strait: their surface features, the composition of the cores and the route of movement of the boulders.
The Frozen Relic project recreates the images of this - already lost - landscape at a scale of 1:10. Ice chunks are offered to be sliced and using a CNC machine; each weighs approximately 5-10 tons. Samples of "Arctic ice" will be brought to the doors of London's most notorious pollutants and left there to melt. The inconvenience that follows should serve as a reminder of the sad state of affairs in the waters of the Arctic Ocean.
Second place
Fisheries Eco-Shelter / Huang Yi (Taiwan)
Eco-Shelterscape of Fishery / Huang Yi
About 40% of the world's oceans are negatively affected by human activities: fishing, coastal zone exploitation and pollution from ships. The most affected are the North, South China and East China Seas. This leads to a decrease in the number of different types of fish, molluscs and other creatures. At the same time, the ocean loses its ability to provide animals with food, maintain clean water and move away from "stress" - like a violent storm.
The author of the project proposes to build “ecosystem houses” from bamboo, filled with sand and silt, where various inhabitants of the sea can live. Thanks to such constructions, the restoration of populations will occur naturally. They also act as a physical obstacle to trawls and encourage fishermen to use traditional fishing methods. The building will be open to visitors, fishermen will be able to rest on the second floor. Taiwan's west coast was selected as an imaginary location.
Third place
"Loyal to the Trees" / Karan Dysaria, Abhishek Rajgor, Ameya Kaulaskar (India)
Treevotees / Karan Daisaria, Abhishek Rajgor, & Ameya Kaulaskar
Mumbai loses more than 10,000 trees every year as a result of infrastructure development with the full connivance of the authorities. Massive logging is fraught with deforestation, rising temperatures in the city and destruction of ecosystems. Members of the imaginary community Treevotees (from devotee - "devotee"; among other things, so called
followers of Krishna) come from different social strata, castes and confessions, but they are united by the desire to save the "green lungs" of the metropolis. The construction of a new metro line has already killed 3,000 trees. The authors propose to channel the religious zeal inherent in the people of India to the protection of nature. Citizens go to the action and then build a symbolic, religious-like structure with their own hands on the empty place to declare themselves, the power of collective protest and multiculturalism.
Honorable Mention
Invisible Rebellion / Edmund Tan Hong Xiang (Great Britain)
The Hidden Riot / Edmund Tan Hong Xiang
This contestant believes that the time has come to use street protests as a disguise, a Trojan horse, and transfer the real riot to the Internet. This will not be difficult: the network is able to unite an infinite number of people around the world; only internet access is required.
