MX Conference 2007. Universidad Iberoamericana. Mexico City

Gabriel Esquivel will lecture at the conference which in general focuses on the idea of "Role of Desire on Form". The conference will take place from October 29th to October 31th. Gabriel's conference is called "AEffect " and will take place on Tuesday October 30th at 11:00 at the Room Crescencio Ballesteros. Universidad Iberoamericana. Santa Fe, Mexico City. Abstract As technology plays an ever-increasing role in creating new physical and virtual atmospheres in film, architecture, and music, the human observer is increasingly aware to the work’s affect upon them. The new modes of production used to create these various works has allowed for a greater assault on the senses. A more human form of expression then comes into being; even as the means of production are moved farther away from the analogue devices. It is through provocation that allows for these new spaces to appear. We are then moving away from a representational form that operates through signs and symbols seeped within the cultural codes of our society, to a form expressed through creative provocation set within a new radical surface. We find ourselves at the end of indexical architecture and its formal premises, from Le Corbusier’s five points in the earlier 20th century all the way to Colin Rowe’s reinterpretation of the modern diagram in the 1960’s, which has dominated the last 50 years of architectural discourse. At the beginning of our digital millennium the pursuits began to change in search of something new based in the potential of new representation, new construction methods, fabrication and consequently the desire for a new aesthetic. What digital technology has allowed is the ability of exacerbating the architectural indexes in the production of a new hyper-indexicality that has resulted in the possibility for a new era. These new surfaces began with the search not only of a performative component like geometry, materiality, conductivity etc. but for an emotional encounter called AFFECT and therefore the production of atmospheres and moods; as a result we can talk about a new aesthetic movement. The use of softwares like Rhino, and Maya allowed to look into complex geometries and their control as well as the rediscovery of “old” architectural effects like” Motion”. Motion was first discussed as part of the Baroque and later at the turn of the 20th century by movements like Art Nouveau. But when did motion abandoned architecture? One speculation is, that as the introduction of cinema developed, it satisfied this desire, and architecture became incredibly narcissistic, involved with the development of its own indexes. It wasn’t until the 60’s that groups like Archigram began to discuss the idea of mechanical motion once again. Within the increasing use of digital sofwares and our societies infatuation with movies, we have recapture the idea of motion as a condition to develop, motion in terms of generative geometry, effects, and robotics to mention a few. This motion needs to be imparted through an emotional theatricality of the radical surface and has ruptured the connection between what is traditionally beautiful, to that which produces affect. This affect in culture needs to offer an argument of sensibility that implies a much more careful understanding of mood and atmosphere. Then is it so radical to propose a new form of expression that is emotive, repetitive but different and produces the sensation of motion?