Total Designer: Authorship in the Architecture of the Postdigital Age - Softcover

Ortega, Lluís

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1945150459 ISBN 13: 9781945150456

Publisher: Actar, 2017

Synopsis

This book develops an alternative and inclusive approach -- based on the hypothesis that the impact of digitalization on architectural culture is similar to the effects of the linguistic turn in philosophy --- and steers clear of exclusive dichotomous approaches, without the foundational reconsideration of the discipline or its ontological conservation.
The Total Designer is a reflection on on the relationship between technology and creation. In a field like architecture, where the temporal dimension is intrinsic to its reason for being, this text adds its contribution to an essay format that is relatively unusual in architectural historiography, but which has had a huge impact on contemporary architecture: how the historical thematization of postindustrial technology has been one of the key issues in capturing a contemporary condition and in the connection between theoretical-critical activity and professional practice.

What is unique here is that Ortega’s interest is focused on the repercussions of a highly technical instrumental context for architects, beyond the conventional fascination with formal prolificacy or the productive efficiency of digital tools. What’s more, its main focus could be defined as an answer to the question of how we should interpret this context in order to help author and time paint together in synchronicity, to help them be more creative and critical, especially in the context of a particular period: in our present, which is already postdigital to some extent.

About this title

About the Author:

Lluís Ortega is an architect, researcher, and educator. He studied Architecture at the ETSAB/UPC, and is Master of Science in Advanced Architectural Design Columbia University (GSAPP), MA in Philosophy, Universitat de Barcelona, and PhD at the ETSAB/UPC. At present he is Associate Professor at IIT and Visiting Professor at the Universidad Torcuato Di Tella in Buenos Aires. Previously he has taught at UIC (Chicago), the ETSAB (Barcelona), the Universidad de Alicante, the Harvard University Graduate School of Design (Cambridge, Massachusetts), and the Akademie der bildenden Künste (Vienna). He co-founded F451arquitectura in 2000, rebranded as Sio2arch in 2014, an internationally awarded and exhibited collaborative practice with Santiago Ibarra, Xavier Osarte, and Esther Segura. Editor of several specialized publications, he was director of Quaderns d’Arquitectura i Urbanisme (Barcelona, 2003-2005), he worked as editor of 2G magazine no. 14 (FOA, Barcelona, 2000), the co-edition of Josep Llinàs’ writings Saques de esquina (Pre-Textos, Valencia, 2002, with Moisés Puente) and of Platform GSD 2008 (GSD/Actar, Barcelona, 2008). He published the reader La digitalización toma el mando (Editorial Gustavo Gili, Barcelona, 2009) and was Adjunct Curator and main designer of the Spanish Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale 2014.

Review:

"What is unique here is that Ortega's interest is focused on the repercussions of a highly technical instrumental context for architects, beyond the conventional fascination with formal prolificacy or the productive efficiency of digital tools. What's more, its main focus could be defined as an answer to the question of how we should interpret this context in order to help author and time paint together in synchronicity, to help them be more creative and critical, especially in the context of a particular period: in our present, which is already postdigital to some extent.
Critique: A seminal and impressively thoughtful work of scholarship, "Total Designer: Authorship in the Architecture of the Postdigital Age" is exceptionally informative, deftly written, and remarkably well organized and presented. Unreservedly recommended for both college and university library Architecture collections and supplemental studies reading lists, "Total Designer" will prove to be of immense practical value and enduring interest to architecture students and professionals." --John Taylor, Midwest Book Review

About this edition

• Publisher: Actar
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1945150459
• ISBN 13: 9781945150456
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 80
• Editor: Puente Moisés