Beyond Metaphor, Mapping Social Systems
Channel: Kelley O'Brien
Date: 2015-02-21

“Beyond Metaphor, Mapping Social Systems” was a workshop featuring University of the Philippines architecture and art students and run by Green Papaya’s artist in residence, Kelley O’Brien, in collaboration with Irish-based academic and writer, Francis Halsall. This three-day event represents the first collaborative effort by O’Brien and Halsall. Their ongoing aim is to address the relationships between theory and practice while highlighting the similarities between the practices of art and architecture.

Starting with an introductory lecture the workshop explored the themes of cognitive mapping and kinetic architecture as methods and concepts to better understand the social systems of the University of the Philippines and their relationship to the environmental space of the campus. After identifying areas of interest within the campus the students were asked to create proposals for how to aesthetically realize social aspects of the community. The nine groups of students explored a combination of social and spatial environments ranging from the hierarchy of permanence seen in three different informal communities on campus to the social effects of the rise of vehicular activity on campus.

Final proposals were presented for critique to guest reviewers and University of the Philippines Alumni Mar Ticao and Antares Bartolome.

Select groups have chosen to continue to refine their proposals over the next two months, while working closely with Kelley O’Brien to produce aesthetic representations that will be exhibited at UP and become part of a traveling exhibition to accompany future workshop iterations in Ireland, the United States of America and other locations.