GSAPP Conversations

Mario Gooden in Conversation with Zoe Kauder Nalebuff.

In this podcast episode, CCCP student Zoe Kauder Nalebuff speaks with faculty Mario Gooden (‘90 MARCH) about his recent performance Working on Water in collaboration with Jonathan Gonzalez and Thuto Durkac Somo ('19 CCCP).

During the conversation, Mario Gooden shares insights around the performance that archive movements and images of black subjectivity. Enacting feminist theorist Tina Campt’s concept of “practicing refusal,” the performance insists on radical witnessing and forms of architectural representation that “refuse authoritative forms of visuality which function to refuse blackness itself.” By acting and moving across various sites, the multimedia piece draws attention to the work occurring outside of the audience’s focus throughout the performance.

Mario Gooden (‘90 M.Arch) is faculty and Co-Director of the Global Africa Lab at Columbia GSAPP and Principal at Huff + Gooden Architects. His practice engages the cultural landscape and the intersectionality of architecture, race, gender, sexuality, and technology.

Mabel O. Wilson in Conversation with Abraham Murrell.

In this podcast episode, recent graduate Abraham Murrell speaks with Professor Mabel O. Wilson. GSAPP recently commissioned a group of alumni to report on the current state of internships in the architecture profession. This is our second podcast to explore this theme in more depth, following a conversation between Violet Whitney and James Brillon.

Professor Wilson discusses her early career path and experience as a MARCH graduate. She also interprets inequity issues within the profession and identifies social, institutional, economical, and historical causes.

Mabel Wilson (’91 MARCH) is the Nancy and George Rupp Professor of Architecture, Planning and Preservation at GSAPP, a Professor in African American and African Diasporic Studies, and the Associate Director of the Institute for Research in African American Studies (IRAAS) at Columbia University. At GSAPP she also co-directs the Global Africa Lab.

The full text of the Internships and the Architectural Profession report can be read on GSAPP's website.

Eleena Jamil in Conversation with Lucy Navarro.

In this podcast episode, MARCH student Lucy Navarro speaks with architect Eleena Jamil about her practice. Working within the context of Southeast Asia, her work has been founded on research into specific social and climatic imperatives of each project brief within a broader cultural framework.

Jamil shares with us her vision around the potential of vernacular architecture and sustainable building materials, such as bamboo and timber, in Kuala Lumpur. She also talks about how her firm’s work designing smaller-scale pavilions has provided opportunities for structural and material experimentation.

The conversation took place at Columbia GSAPP on October 14, 2019 prior to Eleena Jamil’s lecture.

Farzin Lofti-Jam & Caitlin Blanchfield in Conversation with Jesse Connuck.

In this podcast episode, faculty Farzin Lotfi-Jam (MSAAD '12) and PhD candidate Caitlin Blanchfield (MSCCCP '14) discuss their new book Modern Management Methods: Architecture, Historical Value, and the Electromagnetic Image. They speak with Jesse Connuck, who edited the book, which was published by Columbia Books on Architecture and the City in November 2019.

They describe their use of the x-ray as a medium to re-examine modern architecture through a Le Corbusier house at the Weissenhofsiedlung in Stuttgart and the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. Through the discovery and exploration of quotidian objects in the usually heroically depicted buildings, they visualize the overlooked evolving life and invisible moments in the buildings’ history. This research culminated in two exhibitions and is further theorized in their book.

Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg in Conversation with Luiza Furia.

In this podcast episode, MARCH student Luiza Furia speaks with multidisciplinary artist Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg about the central notions in her research. Her artworks, writing, and curatorial projects explore the human values that shape design, science, technology, and nature.

Ginsberg shares with us her concept of “better,” which is oftentimes ambiguously used in synthetic biology to describe a vision of the future. She also expresses her concerns and her attitudes on the ethics and potential of synthetic biology experiments in designing and inventing new species. With her work, she projects an optimistic future to leave an enjoyable and safe planet for the next generations.

The conversation took place at Columbia GSAPP on October 7, 2019 prior to Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg’s lecture.

Charles Renfro in Conversation with José Esparza Chong Cuy.

In this podcast episode, Executive Director and Chief Curator of the Storefront for Art and Architecture José Esparza Chong Cuy (‘12 CCCP) speaks with architect Charles Renfro (‘94 AAD), a partner at Diller Scofidio + Renfro and board member at Storefront.

They discuss their involvement with Storefront and its unique role in the field as a multidisciplinary thought organization. Illustrated with his most important and provocative projects at DS+R and Storefront, Charles Renfro shares his continued interest in queer space and culture-making public facilities that negotiate physical connections among people.

The conversation took place at DS+R’s office on September 19, 2019.

Violet Whitney in Conversation with James Brillon.

In this podcast episode, recent graduate James Brillon ('18 M.Arch) speaks with faculty and alumni Violet Whitney ('17 M.Arch). The School recently commissioned a small group of GSAPP alumni to report on the current state of internships in the architecture profession. James is one of the contributors to the report, and we asked him to expand on the issues in this conversation with Violet. In addition to teaching in GSAPP's Visual Studies sequence, Violet leads computational design and research at Sidewalk Labs. They discuss Violet’s personal experience in her transition from architecture to tech, and how the business models of traditional architecture firms compare to those of a tech company. The full text of the Internships and the Architectural Profession report can be found on GSAPP's website.

Marina Tabassum in Conversation with Amale Andraos.

In this podcast episode, Dean Amale Andros speaks with architect Marina Tabassum about architectural design that respects and prioritizes local communities, contexts, and civic aspects of city life. Marina Tabassum is Founder of Dhaka-based Marina Tabassum Architects (MTA), and Director of Academic Programs at the Bengal Institute for Architecture, Landscapes and Settlements. Her work has established a contemporary architectural language in Bangladesh that is locally rooted. We learn about how her design-oriented studio takes a firm stance on “the path of resistance” in building an unconventionally diverse portfolio. The interview was conducted prior to the 9th annual Kenneth Frampton Endowed Lecture held at the school on September 23, 2019.

Torkwase Dyson in Conversation with Mabel Wilson.

Episode 76 features an excerpt from a conversation between Professor Mabel O. Wilson and New York-based artist Torkwase Dyson about her recently opened exhibition 1919: Black Water. On view at Columbia GSAPP’s Arthur Ross Architecture Gallery through December 14, 2019, the exhibition includes new paintings, sculptures, and drawings that respond to the 100th anniversary of the “Red Summer” of 1919, a period of heightened racial violence across the United States. Dyson creates visual and material systems that explore relationships between bodily movement and architecture, with an emphasis on the ways that black and brown bodies perceive and negotiate space. During the conversation, they discuss systems of subjugation within architectural forms, and ways in which spatial composition is used as a tool for self-liberation. A transcript of the full conversation is published in the exhibition brochure and can be found on the School’s website.

Jesse LeCavalier in Conversation with Emma Macdonald.

In episode #75, Critical, Curatorial, and Conceptual Practices (MSCCCP) student Emma Macdonald speaks with architect Jesse LeCavalier about his research around the global emergence of new public infrastructures. Jesse LeCavalier is the author of The Rule of Logistics: Walmart and the Architecture of Fulfillment and associate professor of architecture at the Daniels Faculty of Architecture at the University of Toronto. He works to engage the public on new types of contemporary infrastructure and logistics by shedding light on their underlying meanings, interrelations, and purposes. This interview was conducted prior to his lecture at the school on September 16, 2019.