Fact Factory
This studio reworked the culture and materials of containment producing a new relationship between scientific production and public reception.
The laboratory is a site for the production of scientific facts. Just as the design of a car is determined by techniques of factory production, scientific facts are constructed by the materials, spatial relationships, and cultural values of its production.
Collaborations among scientists are guided by the arrangement of computer desks and lab benches. Variations in cell growth are made measurable by the repetition of standard-sized containers and controlled lighting conditions. Standards of cleanliness are established by pressurized rooms, Tyvek suits, and solid-surface counters. Above all, the scientific method would not hold true without a culture of consistency and control fundamental to the design of a laboratory.
What defines the laboratory, then, is the notion of CONTAINMENT. Containment protects a bacteria culture from pollutants in the air. It guards against the spread of bio-hazards in the era of Homeland Security. And it stops glow-in-the dark lab mice from breeding with those living inside the walls of a New York tenement. Even beyond this, the very notion of the laboratory would not exist without containment. The laboratory is a highly artificial environment that controls the unwanted interference of the everyday in order to study predetermined variables of the experiment at hand.
If containment in the laboratory affects the PRODUCTION of scientific data and theories, then it also plays a significant role in public RECEPTION of this work. Reception is a tricky matter, especially in the context of genomic research. When faced with news of cloned sheep, goats that produce spider webs, or an uncanny genetic similarity between humans and chimps; public optimism about the triumph of medicine is often tempered by unease about actions that seem far from natural.
This studio will rework the culture and materials of containment, producing a new relationship between scientific production and public reception that offers a critical, nuanced, and open-ended interpretation of the issues of genomic research
Deborah Grossberg
John Cerone
Chris Shelley
Students:
Mehmet Bozatli
John Cerone
Jessica Dobkin
Deborah Grossberg
Eun Mi Lee
Sang-Hwa Lee
Judy Lo
Christopher Shelley
Naoki Sudo
Mateusz Tarczynski
Ammr Vandal
Gladysa Vega-Gonzalez
Master of Architecture Core 1 Studio Fall 2005