Im)material Matters

(Im)material Matters1

Liz Gálvez

I might begin by describing an (Im)material Space thus:

1 The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary defines ‘immaterial’ as ‘not consisting of matter.’ The term ‘(Im)material’ capitalizes on the potential relationship between material and seemingly immaterial matters, all the while acknowledging that immaterial matters, such as air, consist of material with immaterial qualities. An ephemeral space.

445 soy-wax and aggregate bricks. 450 lbs. of soy-wax. 1615 lbs. of gravel aggregate. 2 oz of aquamarine dye 16 oz of lavender fragrance oil

648 square feet of a 2 mil. thick plastic drop cloth. Total weigh of sculpture: 2065 lbs.

2 See the project description for the New York Earth Room and other works by Water de Maria. “The New York Earth Room.” Dia Art Foundation, accessed 27 October 2020, https:// www.diaart.org/visit/ visit-our-locations-sites/ walter-de-maria-thenew-york-earth-roomnew-york-united-states. On the one hand, a quantitative 2 rather than formal account of matter is opportune in describing an ephemeral or phasechanging sculpture. And yet, the notation leaves much to be desired in describing the phase-change, oozy nature of the material. Should we think of wax as solid or liquid? In gallons or in pounds? Additionally, how do we begin to account for the metrics of energic entanglements? (I consumed 16 gallons of gasoline matter in transporting these matters 250 miles from Ann Arbor to Chicago).

This project has had many lives. First, there was an inquiry into softness, temporality, and the digestibility of material matters - an environmentalism of architectural material. The next life of the project, evolved into an epistemic inquiry between matter and energy. How can we ‘know,’ that matter which cannot be seen, but may be felt? Can material record energy, in this case, operating through the lens of warmed air?

Humans have always changed their environment to make it more amenable or comfortable to their situation. Today, it can be argued that the practice of architecture has leaned its study towards the formal deployment of matter, as opposed to its energic one.3 Taking off from such a lineage, Immaterial Matters examines alternatives between matter and permanence, or better yet, between matter and energy. An Immaterial space, then, deploys logics for designing with warmed or hot air. The project examines applicable uses for building with temporal materialities within the fields of architectural fabrication and construction practices via the development of an Immaterial Brick. The Immaterial Brick, composed of soy-wax and gravel aggregate, responds to, records, and importantly, enables air. An Immaterial Space, derived via interior conditioning technology and its energies, considers entangled relationships between architecture and

3 Reyner Banham tells a parable in which a savage tribe “arrives at a campsite and finds it well supplied with fallen timber.” He describes two basic methods for exploiting the environmental potential of the timber material. The first, is to use the wood to construct, the second is to utilize the wood as fuel – to build a fire. Reyner Banham, Environmental Management,” in The Architecture of the Well-Tempered Environment (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1984), 18-28.

Above, material sample (#017. 1) introduces blue color dye into a soy-wax and marble chip aggregate mixture. An increased color intensity occurs where the dye block was not fully dissolved. Wrinkles, slight frosting and cracking are noted.

Right, material sample (#031.4) examines pre-mixing strategies using soy-wax and a pea sized gravel aggregate. The gravel aggregate was pre-rinsed to avoid any coloration in the soy-wax.

Below, worktable, tools, and remnant wax after baking 10 bricks. The ten bricks can be seen on the lower right. Excess or remnant wax as well as defective bricks can be melted down and re-used in subsequent batches.

4 About 2000lbs or forty 50lb bags. environment through questions of the felt, the seen, the visible – the known.

It was at this point in the life of the project, that the pandemic took hold, upended and spun certainties about not only our (seemingly trivial) exhibition timelines, but our lives as we had known and lived them. Nevertheless, raw matters had been purchased. Numerous neatly bound 50 lbs. packages of emulsified soy fat lay dormant upon a bending wooden pallet. A ton 4 of river gravel lay freezing outside of a college driveway. And along with these materials, the dream of tangible, physical work lay as a promised escape from the relentlessness of electric signals that had forged their dominance upon everyday life.

While Immaterial Matters has always been a story between matter and environment, the story began as a quest for the deployment of matter in a designed environment. Hot air was quite literally intended to describe the heated air applied via a series of heat guns into the space of the gallery. What ensued, is rather, much more accurately described as a creation story. A story of wax, rock, the changing of seasons – an always present, changing and surrounding air.