Material Openings: Ark and the materiality of the vessel

If an installation is charged with immersing an audience simultaneously in the alternative worlds to which it gestures, what role might the materiality of the installation play in the transposition of time and space implicit in such an immersion? The vehicle for an investigation into this affective materiality is a reflective case study of ‘the Vessel’ and its making.

Presented, originally, as part of a PhD by Project at RMIT, Melbourne, The Vessel allowed the telling of a story of my architectural practice, Ark. Having been exposed to the Dutch Rationalism of the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, and subsequently immersed in the formalism of the AADRL, Ark was eventually returned to New Zealand and the particular lineage of modernist tectonics from which it stems. Through the apparatus of The Vessel. The research showed how Ark brought these different approaches to architectural making together to the effect of creating new architectural works.

The article focuses on The Vessel itself through the lens of materiality. Doing so relocates The Vessel to new territory where it can open new, alternative design research opportunities.