OPENING: TUESDAY JUNE 2, 7-9.30pm REEF, AN INTERACTIVE INSTALLATION BY ROB LEY & JOSHUA STEIN
JUNE 2 - JULY 25, 2009
'Reef', an interactive installation at Storefront for Art and Architecture by LA-based architects Rob Ley and Joshua Stein, investigates the role emerging material technology can play in the sensitive reprogramming of architectural and public space. Shape Memory Alloys (SMAs), a category of metals that change shape according to temperature, offer the possibility of efficient, fluid movement without the mechanized motion of earlier technologies.
Reef redefines the role of architectural envelope by capitalizing on these emerging material technologies to imbue space with behavioral qualities. In this installation at Storefront for Art and Architecture,the public engages in the new social nuances revealed as exhibition is redefined by exploding the perceived 'wall' separating private and public space. The responsive membrane creates a diverse range of porous and dynamic enclosures capable of producing sophisticated, flexible responses to an existing program. Reef creates an interior condition which reacts according to an exterior street-scape, and reasserts an active role in shaping that public space.
Supported by grants from: Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, AIA Knowledge Grant, IDEC Special Projects Grant
This project was made possible by the generous support and assistance of Dynalloy Inc.
LECTURE: THURSDAY JUNE 4, 7pm ROB LEY & JOSHUA STEIN PRESENT REEF
The creators of Reef, Rob Ley and Joshua Stein, discuss the work of their practices and their investigations into the use of emergent technologies in architecture. Rob Ley is the founding principal of Urbana, an architecture and design studio in Los Angeles. Urbana engages current material and formal technologies to develop environments that respond to human inhabitation and experience. Ley currently teaches graduate design studios and seminars at the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc).. Joshua Stein heads Radical Craft, a Los Angeles based studio that investigates urban and material patterns while focusing on the intersection of traditional craft and contemporary fabrication techniques. He has taught design studios and seminars at Cornell University, SCI-Arc, Woodbury University, and the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design as well as fabrication workshops in Barcelona, Istanbul, and Krefeld (D).
DISCUSSION: THURSDAY JUNE 11, 7pm STOREFRONT AT TATE MODERN, LONDON
VITO ACCONCI AND STEVEN HOLL IN CONVERSATION, MODERATED BY JOSEPH GRIMA
On June 11, Vito Acconci and Steven Holl will meet at Tate Modern to discuss the process of collaboratively designing Storefront's iconic façade, 16 years after its completion. The discussion is part of Architecture+Art: Crossover and Collaboration, a series of trans-disciplinary investigations organized by London's Architecture Foundation into how collaborative and artistic approaches can change the practice and products of architecture.
