Projecting the uncanny : the intersection of visuality and architecture

This thesis explores architectural drawings and representations appropriate to describe forms and spaces in zero and artificial gravity. Its focus is on the physical forces associated with life and motion in a rotating environment and the formal and geometric architectural response to those forces. Orthographic drawing relies on a flat plane onto which lines are statically inscribed. This project hopes to speculate on an alternative drawing that can help to describe habitation and the uncanny experience of life in space. Without the constraints of gravity, architecture is no longer forced to have plumb walls, that floors, or ramps with specific ratios. Zero gravity presents itself with its own challenges of disorientation and visual confusion. This project will juxtapose the effects of zero gravity with the spaces imbued with artificial gravity generated by centripetal force. Human experience in outer space is tied to feelings of disorientation and distortion. This project seeks to understand these perceptual changes in order to adapt the human body to a new way of seeing. The visualization of movement through the presence of the human body and its role in orientation and perception will set the parameters for an experiential representation of life in space.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Architecture.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2016

Author dc:creator

• Kitayama, Karen

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Joel Lamere.

• Architecture.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/103434

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/103434