The Architectural League of New York invites architects, artists, designers, technologists,engineers, urbanists, or teams thereof, to submit qualifications for an exhibition that will critically explore the evolving relationship between ubiquitous / pervasive computing and urban architecture. The League will commission five to seven teams to develop urban interventions -to be installed in and around New York City in spring 2009- that will imagine alternative trajectories for how various mobile, embedded, networked, and distributed forms of media, information and communication systems might inform the architecture of urban space and/or influence our behavior within it. Commissioned projects will receive support ranging from 5.000 to 25.000 Dollars.
The exhibition continues the League’s commitment to supporting original research into the implications of ubiquitous/pervasive computing for architecture and urbanism. In fall2006, the League, along with the Center for Virtual Architecture and the Institute for Distributed Creativity (iDC), presented “Architecture and Situated Technologies,” a 3-day symposium organized by Omar Khan, Trebor Scholz, and Mark Shepard, that brought together researchers and practitioners from art, architecture, technology and sociology to explore the emerging role of Situated Technologies in the design and inhabitation of the contemporary city. The project continued in winter 2007 with the publication “Urban Computing and Its Discontents,” the first of nine pamphlets to be published over the next three years that explores how our experience of the city and the choices we make in it are affected by mobile communications, pervasive media, ambient informatics and other Situated Technologies.
The Challenge
The Architectural League seeks to commission architects, artists, designers, technologists, engineers and related practitioners to produce urban “interventions” that demonstrate alternative trajectories for imagining this near future Sentient City. We are interested in expressions of interest that not only re-imagine applications for the various mobile, embedded, networked, and distributed forms of media, information and communication systems introduced by the paradigm of pervasive/ubiquitous computing, but that also critically explore the technê of contemporary social networks, media ecologies, and urban and environmental systems that this paradigm introduces or redefines.
Privacy, Security, and Dataveillance
How might Situated Technologies address the situation where we are increasingly compelled to trade privacy for security? The disclosure of detailed and extensive personal information has become the price we pay for privileges of easy access and enhanced mobility. EZ-Pass RFID tags enable commuters both quick passage through tollbooths on bridges and interstate highways as well as enhanced tracking of suspected terrorists bylaw enforcement agencies. “Trusted Traveler Programs” such as NEXUS and SENTRI offer expedited border crossing“for low risk, pre-approved travelers,” effectively producing an elite travel class. Yet perhaps more troubling is the introduction of new technologies for data acquisition that are invisible to the average citizen. How might we make visible the various dataveillance techniques made possible by read/write RFID tags and GPS enabledmobile devices when identity, location and time-stamps are shared, aggregated and mined by networked information systems?
Social Space
The dialogue between technology and sociality is longstanding. As Georg Simmel noted at the beginning of the20th century, “before busses, railroads and trains became fully established during the 19th century, people were never in a position to have to stare at one another for minutes or even hours on end without exchanging a word.” Along with new technologies come new social spaces spawning a variety of spatial practices for mitigating awkward or inconvenient situations. The social impacts of the telegraph, telephone, television and Internet are extended to the physical space of the city by the iPod and the mobile phone. Simultaneously a means of sensorial extension and amputation (McLuhan), these technologies have been cited both for atomizing public spaceand connecting publics in new ways. What new techno-social situations can we project in this near-future Sentient City? How might we imagine new spatial applications of technology that work toward greater social integration and at the same time maintain the possibility of the serendipitous encounter?
Environment
As environmental sensing technologies become less expensive and more readily available in consumer markets,what new forms of public participation in the monitoring of environmental conditions are enabled? In the wake of the EPA fiasco surrounding the accuracy of reports concerning the environmental impact of the destruction of the World Trade Center, new practices of what has come to be called “Citizen Science” are emerging where the reporting of local environmental conditions are placed (literally) in the hands of the ordinary citizen. How can we imagine ways that these reports have an agency that has a direct impact on our experience of the city and the choices we make within it? How can this information be aggregated and displayed in ways that can compete with the perceived authority of those from established scientific bodies and governmental agencies?
Advocacy
Advocacy is the act of arguing on behalf of a particular issue, idea or person, and addresses issues such as self-advocacy, environmental protection, the rights of women, youth and minorities, social justice, the re-structured digital divide and political reform. How might Situated Technologies be mobilized toward changing and/or influencing social or political policies, practices, and beliefs? What new forms of advocacy are enabled by contemporary location-based or context-aware media and information systems? How might they lend tactical support to the process of managing information flows and disseminating strategic knowledge that influences individual behavior or opinion, corporate conduct or public policy and law?
Submission Details
The League is only requesting qualifications as described below in this first stage; full proposals for projects are not required. A shortlist of finalists will be chosen to develop a full project proposal. A total of five to seven projects will be commissioned with support of 5.000 to 25.000. All projects must be developed specifically for this exhibition and cannot have been previously presented publicly.
Submission Requirements
- Statement of Interest (2 pages maximum): The Statement of Interest is intended to articulate your interests in the theme of the exhibition. Please note that specific proposals are not requested and will not be reviewed at this time. What interests you about this exhibition? What themes, concepts, sites, or technologies might you explore? What perspective and/or experience do you bring to the project? Have you installed projects in public space before? If so, describe the project and the outcome.
- CV / Resume (5 pages maximum)
- Images and Descriptions of Past Work (5 pages maximum)
- The entire submission package must be submitted as a single pdf file of not more than 10 MB.
Submission Deadline
All submissions must be emailed to sittech [at] archleague [dot] org by 18:00 on 27 June 27 2008.
Selection Process
A selection panel will review qualifications and past work with the goal of selecting approximately fifteen finalists to develop full project proposals, from which five to seven proposals will be commissioned.
Selection Panel
- Amanda McDonald Crowley (Executive Director, Eyebeam)
- Rosalie Genevro (Executive Director, The Architectural League of New York)
- Omar Khan (Co-Editor, Situated Technologies Pamphlet Series)
- Laura Kurgan (Director, Spatial Information Design Lab)
- Gregg Pasquarelli (Partner, SHoP Architects)
- Trebor Scholz (Co-Editor, Situated Technologies Pamphlet Series)
- Mark Shepard (Co-Editor, Situated Technologies Pamphlet Series)
- Gregory Wessner (Exhibitions Director, The Architectural League of New York)
Schedule
May 2008: Request for Qualifications announced
May - June 2008: Submission period, Q & A
27 June 2008: RFQ submission deadline
14 July 2008: Shortlist announced
03 September 2008: Project proposals due
26 September 2008: Commissions announced
October 2008 - April 2009: Project development
May 2009: Exhibition opening
August 2009: Exhibition closing
December 2009: Catalogue publication