M.Arch 3 (Master of Architecture) initial design project exploration - A world without nature

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Perceptions of Sublimity: An exploration of cognitive responses to the sublime encounter and its transcendence through art history and science fiction.   

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The projects in my M.Arch 3 year explore the ideas of the natural sublime and the perceptions of it through creative representation. It investigates the theories surrounding the alluring nature of the vastness, darkness, solitude and obscurity of those environments. From this exploratory piece, I look at the potential characteristics of the individual living in a catastrophic reality. Inspired by specific themes and aesthetics in the influential art of the romantic era, and of Hollywood films that present similar themes in their representation. Films such as: Blade Runner. Scott, R (1982), Blade Runner: 2049, Villeneuve. D (2017), 2001: A Space Odyssey. Kubrick, S. (1968) and Interstellar. Nolan, C. (2014). Mediums which successfully represent the beauty in this vastness, the attraction of power or the silence of the desert. Creative outlets which are inspired by the perception of these pieces of sublimity.

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I draw from scholarly texts and studies on cognitive responses to human attractions, specifically to natural and digital sublime, for it is the response to that form of sublimity which I want to explore, its modern day representation and its catastrophic future equivalent in which my design work is situated. This project analyses the imagery in creative medium, to further explore the ideas of sublimity in it's own respective aesthetic. The theories surrounding phenomena like darkness, mountain landscapes, obscurity and the dread of night usually make a thing intriguing enough to arouse the emotional connection associated with the sublime. Space emptied of matter, light and sound or other humans resulting in this solitude; the capital source of the sublime. The solitude represented by the recurring silhouette figure in my visuals, aptly named "The Wanderer". My work explores the why, without fully answering it, I feel it’s more interesting this way. Leaving this question with some wonder at the end. The question of why in this catastrophic, yet undeniably beautiful reality, humans have developed this evolutionary characteristic to react to the sublime almost like moths to a flame? What is the reason for our historic yearning for a sublime experience? This project considers the relationship between humans and intrigue, catastrophe and the sublime, or rather the sublimity of a cataclysmic event, in other words, the seduction of Armageddon. The project is situated in a place between legible and illegible, between reading and un-reading.