Goldsmiths, University of London
Centre for Research Architecture
Department of Visual Cultures
New Cross, London
United Kingdom
SE14 6NW
A multi-disciplinary, practice-led investigation into the frontier of architecture, art, and politics in the Department of Visual Cultures at Goldsmiths, University of London.
The Centre for Research Architecture offers graduate students the opportunity to work at the cutting edge of new research paradigms that bring space, politics, media, law, human rights, and art into productive tension with each other. It sets out to question the two separate terms that constitute its name, seeking to open up the discipline and praxis of architecture—understood as the production of rarefied buildings and urban structures—into a shifting network of spatial practices that includes many other forms of intervention. It contests the utilitarian, applied, means-to-ends relation between knowledge and action that is evoked by the term research and the artificial opposition between theory and practice it implies. The Centre’s mode of operation draws on the vocabularies of urbanism, architecture, environmental studies, science, aesthetics, and philosophy in order to develop spatial practices into an open-ended form of critical inquiry.
The MA programme has been developed to allow members to combine theoretical inquiry with critical spatial production. Lectures, seminars, and workshops equip you with a rigorous grounding in spatial theory. The theoretical course provides a thorough coverage of the historical, philosophical, and technological aspects of the intersection of space, power, and conflict. Participation in the programme is organised around the undertaking of a single major spatial research project in the milieu of an independent studio. Responding to a yearly brief, each project actively engages with spatial research and concentrates on a distinct issue, process or site. As with our renowned MPhil/PhD track, our MA programme draws together a multidisciplinary mix of innovative architects and other spatial practitioners, typically in the early stages of their careers.
Team
Susan Schuppli, Acting Director, Senior Lecturer
Eyal Weizman, Director, professor
John Palmesino, Studio Course Convener
Andy Lowe, lecturer
Areas of graduate research include Border Regimes, Image Migrations, Algorithmic Activism, Aerial Violence, Sonic Spaces, Sensing Injustice, Architecture & the Anthropocene, Mineral Rights & Wrongs, Logistics & Supply Chains, War Hotels, Forensic Oceanography, Militarized Urbanism, Legal Media, Modeling Climate Change, Land Claims, Indigenous Movements, Radical Meteorology
Recent visitors: Adam Broomberg & Oliver Chanarin, Thomas Keenan, Sheila Jasanoff, Laura Kurgan, Lindsay Bremner, Rony Brauman, Teddy Cruz, Graham Harman, Bruno Latour, Trevor Paglen, Steve Goodman, Milica Tomic and Grupa Spomenik, Derek Gregory, Christoph Keller, Lars Bromley, D. Graham Burnett, Alice Ross, Ariella Azoulay
Operative thought: Michel Feher, Visiting Professor 2013–2015 on “The Age of Appreciation: Six Lectures on the Neoliberal Condition”
Academic environment
The Centre for Research Architecture is part of theDepartment of Visual Cultures, a culturally diverse and intellectually challenging environment for exploring and producing new forms of contemporary art and theoretical practices. The department is well known for its experimental and innovative engagement in the field of visual culture and more broadly within a framework of critical theory, philosophy, and cultural studies. Included are issues of cultural difference, performativity, visual display, aurality, encounters with audiences, spatial practices and the production of subjectivities. As a member of the MA in RA, you will have the opportunity to participate in weekly lecture programmes, workshops, and other activities organized by the department.
How to apply
The programme begins in late September and runs for one full year. Places in the MA in Research Architecture are very competitive. They are not limited to graduates of architecture, but open to a range of other disciplines provided that you have, or expect to gain, an undergraduate degree of at least second-class standard. A good portfolio of practical and/or scholarly work and a demonstrable interest in critical spatial practices are essential. The MA operates in full- and part-time modes.
Additional information:
Dr. Susan Schuppli, Acting Director: [email protected]
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