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xyzzy

Part 2 Project 2024
Simone Chait
Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology | Australia
xyzzy1 is an exploration into the absolute line we straddle between physical and virtual worlds. Through the smartphone – a modern prosthetic – this project examines the invisible infrastructures that ghost the city, and the powerful abstractions technology has on us, each other, and our relationship with urban space.

William J. Mitchell argues that each concrete system has a juxtaposing digital counterpart, and to sustain the physical city, traditional architecture must be decomposed, and recombined. This project seeks a new praxis for architecture, where concrete, a physical object that is made redundant, is augmented by an abstract, a non-physical virtuality, which is then returned to a concrete state.

Taking occupancy at the central convergence of digital and physical infrastructure, movement of people and gateway into the CBD, this project is governed by the invisible digital fields that are superimposed onto the traditional city grid. Inspired by Derive, the site becomes a rabbit warren of pathways, subverting the temporal rhythm of the city to match its asynchronous virtual counterpart. The project is then returned to the user through the digital device, augmented again in a constant state of evolution.

1 xyzzy is a gaming command that allows a player to magically toggle between two worlds.

Simone Chait

Tutor(s)


2024
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