After Concrete: Redefining Materials and Energy in the Anthropocene Panel 2
Channel: Columbia GSAPP
Date: 2021-05-21

https://www.arch.columbia.edu/events/2204-after-concrete-redefining-materials-and-energy-in-the-anthropocene

After Concrete: Redefining Materials and Energy in the Anthropocene

For over a hundred years, reinforced concrete has served as a paradigm of wonderous materiality: natural yet human-made, liquid yet permanent, technically specialized yet easy to use. But this myth is beginning to crack physically and conceptually.

As part of a multi-year research project, co-directed by Lucia Allais (Columbia GSAPP) and Forrest Meggers (Princeton), this event asks participants to rethink concrete historically and technically. Scholars, engineers and designers are invited to move the conversation from material dynamics to system dynamics, and from materials to energy and environment, by offering insights into sometimes obscure system processes–such as the carbonation of concrete. The goal is to situate not only concrete but all architectural materials into variously-scaled processes that are inherent in climate change, resource extraction, infrastructural development, energy policy, state planning, and ecological science and advocacy.

Scholars presented an array of technical advances in materials and energy, which critically transform the understanding of how system dynamics play out, spanning vast domains and areas of expertise. We debated the role of academic research in the dissemination of new knowledge through research, narratives, and practice, and how we leverage those across domains to generate substantive interventions and actions, in order to change broad societal perceptions.

Kiel Moe, Gerald Sheff Chair in Architecture, McGill University
Lola Ben Alon, Assistant Professor, Columbia GSAPP
David Benjamin, Associate Professor, Columbia GSAPP
Felix Heisel, Assistant Professor, Cornell AAP
Dan Steingart, Co-director of Columbia Electrochemical Energy Center; Stanley-Thompson Associate Professor of Chemical Metallurgy, Chemical Engineering, Columbia University