Earth Choreographer: Remediating Obsolete Grounds of the Future
Los Angeles, CASpring 2020, B. Arch Thesis, Syracuse University | School of Architecture
+ Faculty Thesis Prize: James A. Britton Memorial Awards
Collaborator: Anna Korneeva
Critic: Julie Larsen, Britt Eversole, Sinead Mac Namara
See thesis website here
Earth Choreographer is a design methodology that focuses on choreographing, scoring, and de-territorializing the landscape of an obsolete oil field. This thesis explores the imperatives and opportunities in remediation and repurposing of obsolete industrial sites, aiming to continuously investigate the potential of the land and possible scenarios over decades—even when the intended life cycle of the industrial site is over. It presents a design process that recognizes the ruination of the ground and the landscape. By acknowledging the evolving technologies and ever-increasing preoccupation with natural resources, it answers the following questions: What happens when a productive landscape is sought to be both partially preserved and recreated? How to represent a ground plane that is being constantly reconfigured by machines with ever-changing boundaries of spaces for human and non-human occupy? And what does a site that constantly erases and reconstructs itself look like?
With several scenarios from 2025 to 2080, this project acts as a prototype for inhabiting obsolete landscapes by addressing climate change and depletion of resources. Its dynamic design methodology allows the site to constantly evolve and change over time based on the needs and interests of its occupiers.
