Interview With Eric Goldemberg Of MONAD Studio

For MONAD Studio architecture refers both to a hardcore family tree of our disciplinar development-- I worked with Peter Eisenman and Asymptote Architecture/Hani Rashid + Lise Anne Couture; and Veronica worked with a team of Greg Lynn, F.O.A./ Alejandro Zaera-Polo + Farshid Moussavi, UN Studio/Ben van Berkel + Caroline Bos, and RUR/Jesse Reiser + Nanako Umemoto in New York -, as well as the opportunity to check out a network of art cooperations through style, outside of what would be developed as the limitations of the discipline; this is done through exhibition style, digitally made paintings and sculptures, collaborations with video-artists and musicians, etc. We share all style duties, and she is also my motivation; she has a wild spirit that transpires through her paintings and it comes back to our styles through mystical feedback processes; so far her art work functions on a parallel dimension-- even though we do all in the same storage facility-- however there is an unspoken viral contamination throughout her painter activity and our architecture. It proposes a novel vital reception of computational architecture based in the capacity for the reception of digital design to engage with core aspects of the discipline such as time-based operations and efficiency. The interest in problems relating to repetition and difference, rhythmic perception, and memory & identity have to do with that heritage and our interest in the concepts of the avant-garde in New York are also to be traced back to that early formation; both Veronica and I craved what was going on at Columbia University for a long time while designing and developing our early tasks in Buenos Aires, and we lastly went to study at Columbia in 2001-2002, which was an influential experience for the type of work we do now. One of them is The Wolfsonian-FIU Museum exhibition job where we are running in different capabilities, from co-curators to producers and designers of the exhibit installation that will display Art Nouveau items from the museum's collections developed by the likes of Hector Guimard, Henry van de Velde, and Victor Horta, in discussion with digitally produced things designed by contemporary architects such as Greg Lynn, Hernan Diaz Alonso, Mark Gage, and David Ruy.



Eric Goldemberg: Fabio, it is my pleasure to try at addressing this concern by saying that I may not match any of the job descriptions you point out, or I might be all of them simultaneously ... but I like rather the unidentified choice much better due to the fact that it provides me and my partner Veronica Zalcberg the opportunity to keep challenging any tags that people may want to use to our activities and ruminations.
Moreover, I am likewise an academic (I am a full-time professor and digital style coordinator at the School of Architecture at FIU - Florida International University in Miami), a book author, exhibits curator & manufacturer, even a video artist and general cultural scavenger too-- you must see the sort of odd things that are collected at our MONAD Studio storage facility! ... but let's simply say that 'designer' is an extensive term that manufactures our spatial engagement with the world of design, which 3D digital design and fabrication is our medium of choice, our knowledge that permits us access to other channels of expression.
3dd: So what is with the snorkeling? I think the photo on the site is genius!
EG: Yes, it is casual and rather amusing however likewise reveals our existential angst; the immersion into a liquid medium where one is without bounding coordinates frees the senses to collar spatial relations of the body through multiplicitous vectorial trajectories that otherwise would be obscured by conventions and presumptions about how the world is to be viewed. Through our work we question precisely the rhythmicity of the cognitive procedure; we are interested in the affects of understanding and the capability to inflect such affective activity; to provoke, to tease, and to change the physical environment through digital methods; some individuals call that architecture and we do not disagree with them.
3dd: I make sure nobody has ever asked you the most easy question yet. What is it for you architecture?
EG: I would say that architecture is a shifting ground due to the fact that the term is nowadays being used for all sorts of things beyond the domain of architecture itself; it has been co-opted by political campaigns, by the corporate world in general, along with becoming an 'autonomus know-how' term that explains the structure or procedure of the "ending up being" of anything, truly.
For MONAD Studio architecture refers both to a hardcore family tree of our disciplinar formation-- I worked with Peter Eisenman and Asymptote Architecture/Hani Rashid + Lise Anne Couture; and Veronica worked with a group of Greg Lynn, F.O.A./ Alejandro Zaera-Polo + Farshid Moussavi, UN Studio/Ben van Berkel + Caroline Bos, and RUR/Jesse Reiser + Nanako Umemoto in New York -, as well as the chance to explore a network of art partnerships through design, outside of what would be developed as the limitations of the discipline; this is done through exhibition design, digitally fabricated sculptures and paintings, partnerships with video-artists and musicians, and so on. In any case, our expeditions of that threshold are always done with the lens and the mind of an architect, always seeking for a spatial-emotional dimension of any problem at hand. In other words, although we participate on numerous various mediums, we always operate as architects that we are.
A great example of our technique to architecture is the Memorial for the Victims of the Tsunami in Thailand, where there is an emotional action to the originating catastrophe and yet it is arranged spatially into parts that distribute the perceptual charge throughout a field condition, engaging the superb scale of the impacted landscape and arranging the territory for architecturally fluid experiences. The yard formations weave courses whereby there is a break-down in the magnitude of the occasion which returns to haunt as the memory of multiple micro-events ripple in succession, connected seamlessly down the mountain and all the way down to the beach and ocean blue. The job made the most of an existing drain channel and amplified it to improve the spectacle of water partly flooding the yards, increasing and decreasing according to important rhythms that modify the perceptual field throughout the multiplicitous yards and thus producing a space for consideration, a space to experience the depth of the interaction between memory and identity.
3dd: Monad Studio's design work as you already mentioned is shared with your partner. Can you introduce us better likewise to Veronica Zalcberg?
EG: Veronica and I have actually been partners in architecture and in life practically 20 years, ever considering that undergraduate school in Buenos Aires, Argentina! We share all style responsibilities, and she is likewise my motivation; she has a wild spirit that transpires through her paintings and it comes back to our designs through mystical feedback procedures; so far her art work functions on a parallel measurement-- even though we do all in the very same warehouse-- but there is an unspoken viral contamination throughout her painter activity and our architecture. Veronica is also now leading our nascent furniture and item design venture which is tough MONAD to continue the improvement of digital fabrication techniques, pressing the perceptiveness of in-depth resolution and assembly processes that industrial products need. This pursuit feeds likewise into our architectural jobs such as the Lincoln Road Capacitors, the Tower in Buenos Aires and the MoMA-P.S. 1 Installation in New York where attention to beautiful, clean lines and a break-down of parts into rhythmically charged modularity enable a high degree of control of the last item and its procedure of fabrication.
3dd: I enjoy the statment: 'Monad Studio is a design research practice with focus on spatial perception associated to balanced affect.' Can you describe to us what you suggest by that?
EG: Our practice is concentrated on teasing architectural impacts related to the perception of rhythms in area, boosted by digital innovation and fluid, three-dimensional style.
This is better discussed in my upcoming book 'Pulsation in Architecture' which is coming out in late September published by J.Ross Publishing Inc. and I believe it can be a contribution to our field at a time when digital architecture is asking for a (more culturally robust) program beyond a simple instrumentality.
A survey of practices about our perceptual capacity to sense rhythmic affect in area, it resonates with Antoine Picon's version of performance in architecture.
It highlights the function of digital style as catalyst for a new spatial sensibility associated to rhythmic perception. It proposes a novel vital reception of computational architecture based in the potential for the reception of digital style to engage with core aspects of the discipline such as time-based operations and performance. The generative engine of digital architecture revitalizes a discourse of part-to-whole relationships through the lens of balanced affect.
There is a paradigm shift in spatial perception due to the intensive usage of computational techniques and the capacity to change massive quantities of data into spatial patterns of performance. Pulsation presents the fundamental animate capacity of living kind and reshapes our understanding of architectural space across the multiple scales of a task, from digital inception to fabrication.
An emerging thread of rhythmic perceptiveness binds loosely a survey of practices consisting of contributions by Peter Eisenman, EMBT/Miralles-Tagliabue, Jeffrey Kipnis, Greg Lynn, UN Studio/Van Berkel-Bos, P.Scott Cohen, RUR/Reiser+Umemoto, Asymptote, Ali Rahim, Minimaforms/Theo Spyropoulos, Hernan Diaz Alonso, Ruy-Klein, Gage-Clemenceau, Commonwealth/Boira-Coombes, NOX/Lars Spuybroek, Evan Douglis, Ed Keller, Kokkugia/Roland Snooks, and others.
3dd: You have such a worldwide background and you have actually spent so much time working in Argentina! Your work however is very various from what we normally see coming out of South American offices. Were your work and your orientation towards architecture always so similar to what you do today or did they develop in time?
EG: My parents were both architects and academics in Argentina with a big practice invested in big social housing complexes, done mainly during the 70's. The systemic nature of those jobs remains in my blood stream, no doubt about that. The interest in problems referring to repeating and distinction, balanced perception, and memory & identity pertain to that heritage and our interest in the ideas of the progressive in New York are also to be traced back to that early development; both Veronica and I craved what was going on at Columbia University for a very long time while developing and building our early jobs in Buenos Aires, and we finally went to study at Columbia in 2001-2002, which was a seminal experience for the kind of work we do now. The interest in intricacy theory was there prior to emigrating to do our Masters. We feel today that our work is getting here at a plateau of interest and sophistication that can only be possible by combining our South American origin with the strong desire for the experience at the American academic community, especially the direct exposure to the digital culture that was so hot during our remain at Columbia-- where I later taught studios with Hernan Diaz Alonso and Hani Rashid too. I would say that the expert development we brought from Argentina acquired a particular extensive measurement as we got immersed in academia, creating a productive feedback between the two scenes.
Being from Argentina, we bring a particular strength, enthusiasm, and ingenuity to approaching and fixing design issues that distinguishes our practice and offers it a particular flavor that is the outcome of being awake, all senses inform to deepen meaningful chances provided by every project, be it a building, an art setup, a book, or a painting. They are all approached with the muscle of the naked eye.
3dd: The work that you show online on www.monadstudio.net is an excellent teaser for conversations on what the future might be or likewise on what today must appear like. Is there a genuine expediency behind these jobs?
EG: Absolutely! We are now on developmental phase of three jobs that function as lorries for the expedition of the required technology. One of them is The Wolfsonian-FIU Museum exhibition project where we are running in various capabilities, from co-curators to manufacturers and designers of the exhibition installation that will display Art Nouveau things from the museum's collections developed by the similarity Hector Guimard, Henry van de Velde, and Victor Horta, in discussion with digitally made items designed by contemporary architects such as Greg Lynn, Hernan Diaz Alonso, Mark Gage, and David Ruy.
Our screen system consists of several vitrine-environments woven together by a system of 'raised roots' that produce the visual story and support the lighting and atmosphere of The Wolfsonian's galleries. We are going through the procedure of studying a number of iterations of high-density foam coated with polyurethane-treated paint, and a lot of sanding! The most difficult part is calibrating the trim of the polygonal modeling so that one can subdivide the geographies of the parts and justify the assembly: simply put, we are trying to figure out how to cut the salami, effectively!
3dd: This is a really cool metaphor the among the salami! Now, I am going to ask you this just due to the fact that otherwise our readers will ask it to me instead! Which software do you utilize the most?
EG: I utilize primarily Maya for 3D modeling; it is almost a 3rd partner! We also use a variety of software application for the different stages of a job, including Rhino for digital fabrication and 3D Max for visualization.
3dd: Is there a specific relationship between the software you use and the kind of architecture you produce? I see in your work a lot of polygonal and organic modeling, is this the outcome of your computer system abilities or something you were pursuing straight with your imagination?
EG: Working within the restraint and the reasoning of any offered software application is primordial to maximizing the expressive capacity of the work that is going to come out, as well as being able to set yourself up to be 'stunned' by combinatorial logics and extraordinary relational results. We do not seek complete understanding of a provided software; rather, we pick to focus in a couple of various tools that permit us to generate our design techniques, be it polygonal modeling or nurbs surfaces driven.