qing tang portfolio 01
contents
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fibonacci’s cryptex a memorial for civiliation war heroes untitled (installation) a different eye cube house about i
fibonacci’s cryptex: elbows 21² – 13 lines, 8 planes, 5 volumes
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drawing (group)
development
finished
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The form, elbows, consists of and is driven by the idea of protruding and intertwining elements. These qualities, especially the former, reminded me of elbows protruding from the human body, rigid, jagged, pushing through different things. Yet the elbow, as a component, and hence, biological element, of a human being, is inherently organic in its attributes, form and purpose. The unity between all the ele ments, despite the suggested detachedness of 'protrusion', can be described as organic and therefore harmonious. The main and only type of plane is rectangular, sometimes with a large, also rectangular gap — firstly, creating unity between the elements, even with the perceived jaggedness and dissociation of 'protruding', and secondly, making the act of actually making the different elements protrude from each other far easier. The volumes balance out the perceived 'weight' throughout the model while also reinforcing the idea of an element piercing or protruding through a variety of different voids and spaces, manipulating the perception of unity and balance. Rods were used to unify the various elements as well, an attempt to emulate the effect of interweaving, a prominent aspect of my initial 21x21cm sketch. This idea of protrusion, when paired with the idea of unity or harmony, creates what I perceive to be elbows; protruding, rigid, qualities which are seemingly disordered, and yet, harmonious and organic.
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a place of reconciliation: memorial
i. disorientation ii. reflection iii. peace
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model pictures
elevation
section aa
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basement plan
ground floor plan
site: changi chapel museum
12 a memorial was chosen for the site, a patch of land outside changi chapel museum. it allows the user plenty of space and time to reflect and gradually achieve inner peace – one can take their own time to move through the stages which is parallel to how people achieve reconciliation with their own pace. studies of changi chapel museum
Reconciliation – the process of resolving and bringing oneself to accept the past, is arduous and emotionally difficult, often taking years or even decades to develop. This memorial is an attempt to harbour or even ‘convert’ the complex idea of reconciliation into a piece of architecture, a memorial for civilian war heroes, drawing upon Elizabeth Choy’s own experience of reconciliation from the trauma she endured during WWII. An interpretation and analysis of the process of reconciliation in the context of Elizabeth Choy could be firstly, disorientation/disorder, caused by the experience of traumatic events, displacement from normal, everyday activities and hence generating conflicting thoughts of people, ideas, society, etc., secondly, reflection/contemplation upon these conflicting thoughts, and lastly bringing gradual synthesis of these thoughts to achieve a new peace. In this memorial, disorientation is firstly created by the user’s approach from ground level but a sudden drop to the basement after ascending onto a few small steps. Another method used to create disorientation was the sudden change from the darkness and claustrophobia of the basement into a bright (even blinding) light, an attempt to recreate the daze and disorientation caused by suddenly being woken by blinding light from sleep in total darkness. The second space created was one of contemplation. The space is semi-open, tall and has skylights orientated away from the sun, letting in a more subtle and less blinding light allowing space for the user to contemplate. The third space is of peace. An attempt to create this was of a gradual linear incline and hence ‘ascension’ up into a taller roof, more light and wider space. early conceptual model – falling planes supporting each other
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excerpts from sketchbooks
evoking the emotion of reconciliation through forms
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strolling outside changi women’s prison
studies of pantheon nube - clavel arquitectos
excerpts from sketchbooks
pre-decay
post-decay, three months later
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a different eye
24-hour city observation – being a flâneur
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cube house
an artist’s hideaway
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first storey plan
second storey plan
B
A
B
A
A
A
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B
B
section aa
s
MASTER BEDROOM
STUDIO
POWDER ROOM
section bb
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roof detail
floor/ceiling detail
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floor detail
north elevation
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west elevation
Tara Donovan created her glass cube by stacking over two hundred square sheets of tempered glass together within a frame and hammering the sides, resulting in the tiny pieces of the shattered sheets adhering to each other. The cubes created with the pins and the toothpicks were done in a similar fashion – with a frame and the chosen material ‘sprinkled full’ inside. These three cubes not only showcase each material’s elemental uniqueness, but the paradoxical nature of the material adhering in this manner, “[amplifying] not only the ap pearance of cohesion, but also the inference of instability”. Each cube appears on the verge of crumbling apart, but each individual pin, toothpick, or shard of glass, coheres, with a combination of density, gravity, and friction, into a freestanding structure.
The essence of the glass cube is that the impact from the artist hammering the cube is diffused into the cube, tracked by a series of various cracks on the surface and the inside of the cube. Transcribing the idea of tracks on the cube onto an architectural scale, the point of impact slices and diffuses through the cube from various outside points, scrambling the insides into various different volumes whilst, externally, still maintaining a pure form.
The fragile, almost decay-like yet structurally integral form of Tara Donovan’s glass cube fuses the idea of the artificiality of a cube and the randomness of nature. With Cube House, a harmonious coexistence between cube and nature is attempted. The parti diagram transcribes the essence of the construction of the glass cube onto a pure form. parti
untitled (2005), installation view
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excerpts from sketchbooks
40 qing tang | 鄧晴 singapore polytechnic diploma in architecture year one about enjoys music, art, architecture, philosophy contact qingtang@me.com http://qingtang.wix.com/portfolio +65 9070 2620