MPavilion

Good design is essential for creating sustainable, inclusive, healthy and beautiful places, but can we actually measure ‘good design’? And if so, how should this influence how we design places?

The Office of the Victorian Government Architect brings us a fast-paced MTalks panel discussion exploring the tangible and intangible benefits of good design for health, education, public spaces, transport and neighbourhoods. For each of these themes, a design champion in government-led projects and a design expert from the Office of the Victorian Government Architect’s Victorian Design Review Panel will respond to these burning questions.

Jill Garner, Victorian Government Architect, and Andrew Mackenzie, from City Lab, will lead the conversation, and curtail any runaways or over-timers, while the following luminaries of the built-form sphere will present their cases.

For health: Stefano Scalzo, Victorian Health and Human Services Building Authority; Paul Katsieris, of firm Katsieris Origami; and Sophie Patitsas, Office of Victorian Government Architect. For education: Richard Leonard from practice Hayball; and Kerstin Thompson of Kerstin Thompson Architects. For public spaces: Adam Nitschke from Parks Victoria; Kirsten Bauer of Aspect Studios; and Bronwen Hamilton, Office of Victorian Government Architect. For transport: Kate Hardwick of Melbourne Metro Rail Authority; and Cameron Ritter of Grimshaw Architects. For neighbourhoods: Dan Brady from Development Victoria; and Billie Giles-Corti from RMIT.

Photos by Simon James, John Gollings and Andrew Wuttke

This event is made possible by the Hugh D T Williamson Foundation through funding for MPavilion’s series of events looking at design & science.

Our current historical moment is one of profound global friction and uncertainty. From the ugly spectre of heightened tension in the Korean peninsula, underlined by the threat of nuclear weapons, to US President Donald Trump’s recent threats to drop the Iran Deal, the grave threat of nuclear conflict looms worryingly large. In the face of these perilous times, the growing imperative of a coordinated global ban on nuclear weapons is undeniable.

Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2017, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) is working tirelessly to bring to an end to the most destructive weapon ever created. Originating in Australia in 2007, ICAN is a coalition of grassroots non-government groups in more than 100 nations. The organisation worked on negotiations for the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which was adopted by 122 countries in July 2017.

Join us at MPavilion for a momentous MTalks with ICAN co-founder Tilman Ruff and former ICAN board member, Emeritus Professor Fred Mendelsohn. Discussing the ICAN mission and the current geopolitical climate, they will illuminate the pathway to a nuclear-weapon-free world.

New for MPavilion 2017: Friday night debates. We put leading and emerging minds in architecture behind the microphones and pit them head-to-head in a series of debates on architecture.

On this Friday night, a six-person panel of established architects considers a critical issue in Australia today: affordable housing. The proposition posits: Is affordable housing just for the middle class? How can existing development methods and alternative housing options offer solutions to this zeitgeist dilemma?

Over the course of an hour, our group of architects will state their perspectives on a series of propositions. Will our architects go toe-to-toe or unanimously agree? Come to MPavilion to find out.

After the debate, stick around for drinks, networking and a very special DJ to be announced soon.

Join Alexis Wright, award-winning author of Carpentaria and The Swan Book, in conversation with Readings bookseller Chris Dite to speak about her new book Tracker: Stories of Tracker Tilmouth—to be launched by Indigenous activist Jacqui Katona.

Tracker is a collective memoir of the charismatic Aboriginal leader, political thinker and entrepreneur Tracker Tilmouth, who died in Darwin in 2015 at the age of 62. Tracker was a visionary, a strategist and a projector of ideas, renowned for his irreverent humour and his determination to tell things the way he saw them. Having known him for many years, Alexis Wright interviewed Tracker, along with family, friends, colleagues, and the politicians he influenced, weaving his and their stories together in a biography composed of many voices. The book is as much a testament to the powerful role played by storytelling in contemporary Aboriginal life as it is to the legacy of an extraordinary man.

Tracker is published in November 2017 by Giramondo Publishing.

The ‘smart’ city, the ‘liveable’ city, the ‘sustainable’ city—are these empty concepts, utopian metaphors or strategic objectives? And can cities be all these things at the same time, or are they dynamic emergent services that cities strive to provide their citizens?

This panel discussion—curated by Swinburne University of Technology and moderated by Peter Graham, deputy director of Swinburne’s Centre for Urban Transitions—will address these issues by focussing on the concept of a ‘responsive’ city, looking at the role of technology in empowering citizens to participate in the regeneration of smart, liveable and sustainable urban environments.

Together, this panel of experts will discuss responsive urban environments as well as the digital infrastructure supporting citizen participation in urban design, planning and regeneration, using examples from Barcelona, London and Melbourne. Inspired by these case studies, the goal is to move beyond the buzzwords and get to the bottom of how people can be meaningfully empowered by the intelligent urban spaces they live in.

This event is made possible by the Hugh D T Williamson Foundation through funding for MPavilion’s series of events looking at design & science.

In the midst of the Australian government’s widely criticised postal plebiscite on marriage equality, the ‘Yes’ campaign mobilised thousands of people—many involved in a political campaign for the first time in their lives. Now that the ‘yes’ result is in, where will these energies turn after the poll? And what will be the marriage equality movement’s next priorities?

In this special MTalks session, ABC broadcaster and anthropologist Sally Warhaft will facilitate a discussion with Dennis Altman, Emeritus Professor of Politics at La Trobe University; Ro Allen, the Victorian government commissioner for gender and sexuality; and Imam Nur Warsame. Together, they’ll discuss with sensitivity the outcome of the postal vote, the government’s next steps, and the implications for equality in Australia more broadly.

The drive towards smart cities is accelerating all over the world, with governments and private enterprises becoming increasingly eager to take part in the technology-driven push for more sustainable, efficient, clean and safe cities. But where does the ‘smart citizen’ come into the picture?

This public forum will explore a citizen-centric view of smart cities, looking at how interaction designers, architects, software engineers and interactive media specialists can create opportunities and shape practices specifically for citizens to embrace—all in the name of creating more liveable, sociable and sustainable urban futures. Chaired by Yvonne Rogers—the internationally acclaimed researcher, author and Professor of Interaction Design at University College, London—this forum will ask of its panel of experts (scroll down for speaker details!) and audience the what, where and how of augmenting people with emerging technologies.

This event is made possible by the Hugh D T Williamson Foundation through funding for MPavilion’s series of events looking at design & science.

Photo by Sebastian Voortman

Macau has undergone major shifts over the past 500 years. From merchant port of refuge and gateway for Jesuit missionaries to a 20th-century modernist Portuguese province—it has always been a place traversed by poets and artists. The Macau of today is a phantasmagoric site for gambling that rivals Las Vegas.

Come down to MPavilion for an enlightening conversation between artist John Young, novelist Brian Castro and writer/curator and Honorary Fellow at the Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne, Natalie King, to celebrate the launch of Macau Days.

Macau Days is a tri-lingual publication including poetic texts by Brian Castro and artworks by John Young, as well as classic Macanese recipes designed to engage shared histories of Macau. Natalie will draw from her experiences fostering numerous projects throughout Asia to lead a discussion about art, poetry, food and fiction.

This event is supported by the J.M. Coetzee Centre for Creative Practice and the EU Centre for Global Affairs, University of Adelaide and published by Art + Australia. Art + Australia is a publishing and research body based at the Victorian College of the Arts (VCA), University of Melbourne.

New for MPavilion 2017: Friday night debates. We put leading and emerging minds in architecture behind the microphones and pit them head-to-head in a series of debates on architecture.

In Melbourne, we’re lucky to have a strong culture of discourse in the architecture industry, which starts from first year of architectural studies, critiquing our peers and critiquing ourselves against our peers’ work. These student debaters represent a cross-section of what Victorian students think about architecture beyond the classroom.

On this spring evening in November, join the current crop of emerging architecture students who together—but on opposing sides of the argument—will dissect the question: ‘In this new century, should we take risks or follow the traditional values in the architecture industry?’ Over the course of an hour, our group of student architects will state their perspectives on a series of propositions.

Speakers include: Isabella Peppard, Monash University, Year 1 Masters; Daniel Bickle-Lazarow, RMIT University, Year 2 undergraduate; Ilana Razbash, RMIT University, Year 2 Masters; Leonie Csanki, the University of Melbourne, Year 1, 300pt Masters; Diana Panagakis, the University of Melbourne, Year 1, 300pt Masters.

Image by Claire Scorpo

Join Patrice Sharkey, the director of Melbourne’s long-running CBD gallery West Space, as she presents the 46th WRITING & CONCEPTS lecture.

WRITING & CONCEPTS is both a public lecture series and publication produced by Jan van Schaik and published by ART + AUSTRALIA that reflects on the relationship between the process of writing and the development of social, political and philosophical questions within contemporary arts and cultural practice.

Come meet Patrice Sharkey at MPavilion as she guides us through her lecture on the heady intersection of contemporary art, philosophy and writing.

Lisa Radford, 'Dear Masato, all at once', West Space, Melbourne, 2016. Photo by Teresa Noble.