A Natural History of Logistics and Other Studio Briefs: Problem Spaces for Planetary Design

Abstract

Peer-reviewed article forthcoming in Cultural Politics journal issue 19:3 (2023). The article stems from the project Operational Images and Visual Culture (funded by the Czech Science Foundation grant 19-26865X). Abstract: This article addresses the question of the planetary through three practices that relate to design and architectural pedagogy and research as well as the broader context of Anthropocene discussions. From Strelka Institute’s Terraforming program to the Terra Forma book by Aït-Touati, Arènes, and Grégoire and a discussion of Royal College of Art’s Architecture program’s studio “Something in the Air: Politics of the Atmosphere” the article focuses on framing of “problem spaces” (Celia Lury’s term) through studio briefs as well as experimental visualization and mapping. While discussing some methodological underpinnings of planetarity as such a problem space, the article mobilizes the neologism a natural history of logistics to analyse practices of scale in the critical design studio briefs and discourses at the centre of the article. The term is pitched as one temporary conceptual anchor for a specific relation to technological framing of a polyscalar Earth as it emerges in design discourses and practice-based approaches.