M.Arch. Thesis

My thesis developed a response to the following question: “How can vernacular building traditions and architectural processes in Southern Brazil be utilized as basis for an improved method of construction?”

Arguing for a new vernacular architecture that is transitional and authentic, this thesis reflected on the works of Gordon Matta-Clark in their intent to both create awareness of a person’s incorporated memory, and to upend it. Furthermore, it posed that the same kind of incorporated memory that is activated through Matta-Clark’s oeuvre leads dancers on a stage (through practice and study of their art), as well as traditional builders (through practice and study of their method).

This project studied the process of traditional building in Southern Brazil, and output a performing arts center as its design intervention. It included interviews with dancers and ballet masters for the programmatic response and my own experience as a trained ballerina.

A photographic study of spaces for practice and spaces for performance preceded this work, for a graduate seminar on Architectural Photography. In parallel, my graduate research assistantship led to a study on scaffolding through the lens of Frampton’s Critical Regionalism, which was accepted for a poster presentation at the Architectural Research Centers Consortium (ARCC 2013) Architectural Research Conference at UNCC.