studio hadid’s research @ 13th venice biennale

the results of this year’s research into parametric semiology will be on display at the 13th venice biennale titled “common ground” in the arsenale. the selected models will – together with zaha hadid’s centre piece installation Aurum, her models and research and additional pieces of work of heinz isler, frei otto and philippe bloch – be part of a comprehensive body of research about parametric shell structures, that fills an entire room in the arsenale.

hats off to all our students and special thanks to josip, maya, rhina, indre, matthias, bogdan and daniel for helping out with the installation.

this year’s studio brief “Parametric Semiology II– Olympic Park Rio de Janeiro 2016” called for the research and development of radically innovative spatial models for the sport venues and related auxiliary programmes of the future olympic park in Rio. within the scope of Parametricism this semster’s research focus lies especially on shell structures and their manifold potentials.

students in the studio have been continously researching within the paradigm of Parametric Design for the last few years, testing contemporary design strategies in various scales and within different studio agendas. most recently the semiological capacities of parametrically generated architectural forms were investigated.

following up that research agenda, this semester students will develop urban and architectural prototypes with regard to their semiological readability, based on the urban, spatial, programmatic, or social parameters, that were deducted from the specific programme for Rio’s Olympic Park.

the design of these proto-architectural elemets is based on the thorough research of different shell structures, their formal properties and their multiple potentials for parametric differentiation.