Cooma Art Village

Site Location: Kosciuszko Road, Cooma/Berridale NSW
Programme: gallery, café, library, 3 studios for 3 artists, accommodations and common facilities for artists, curator, their family/guests

Design Approaches
The site is within a remarkable landscape featured by large granite Tors scattered throughout the area between Cooma and Berridale. Once we entered the site, we were immediately attracted by the landscape - the rocks and the trees guided us away from the material world. The rocks, without any adulteration and decoration, represent truth and innocence; they witness life and death, they inform us of time and seasons. The design intends to preserve and at the same time corresponds to the natural qualities of the land.

The complex as a whole meanders along the contours, now and then dialoguing with the tors, and at the same time, ensuring their freedom and accentuating its significance. Let the rock dominate the journey, mark the beginning, form the path, and be the destination. During During the rambling journey, occasionally there appear various sized gardens and courtyards that are protected from the harsh SW winter wind and encourage NE summer breeze, acting as the threshold between outdoor and indoor, private and public, architecture and nature.

Materials & Structure
Rammed-earth ; timber post & beam structure
As the natural resource in the region, earth is unprocessed, economic, heat-storing, durable and recyclable. Aesthetically, the earthen walls possess warm tones and rich textures that echo with the land and blend with the environment, functioning together with the ground as a backdrop for the rocks and trees. Timber posts and beams, bearing similar natural quality as the walls, accentuate the humanitarian feeling of the space and location. The structure’s members are occasionally revealed through the configuration of ceiling panels and steel plates, corresponding to the natural environment where the rocks interlock with trees, protecting them and yet occasionally reveal them.

Art Village - Site Study

Truthfulness


Monument


Revival


Rocks


Primary conceptual plan

Coogee Apartments Design

Overall Streamline Form - connection with landscape

The overall streamline form with subtle level change reflects the topographic slope feature of the site, the mountain, the waves the coastal line, while as the same time has a horizontal aspect that echoes the horizon. The change in level creates movement and dynamic views and interaction between people both inside and outside. The northern open space has a taller ceiling level which as an inviting gesture towards the public.



Street Awning - Protection and Invitation

The overhanging structure protect people from extreme weather conditions, create more potential business for the cafe, and at the same time prevent people from lookup so that the privacy for the residtial levels is ensured.



Vertical Garden on the southern facade

As the southern edge of the building sits right on the boundary. As a compensation for the neighbouring builidng, a vertical garden is created for amenity and aesthetic purpose - another way to connect architecture with nature.



Communal Open Space at the street corner





To fully use the advantage of the corner that has the potential to bring the community together from different directions and abundant northern sun access, a communal open space is created for both the café and the community. The green open space is expectedto act as a threshold between public and private within the building also between commercial zones on the lower end of Beach st. and the quite private residential area towards the north. The open space is covered with certain soil depth with turf on top that also helps reduce the sound transmission from the jazz club below.



Cafe - View towards the beach

Passing through the outdoor area and continue walking down along the building to the café entrance, people's view will be oriented towards the beach.



Apartment features

1) Four apartments have balconies
2) all apartments have dual aspect of cross ventilation which enables the elimination of air-conditioning which encourages natural breezes.. Especially, the in and out shapes help accelerate natural ventilation within the space.
3) Windows as picture frames applied in apartment design
4)Natural lighting source coming from two directions makes the space more comfortable than a single opening, according to the pattern study.



Sky Garden - Landscape and View

A roof garden above residential level which as spectacular view towards the ocean. The roof also has the sloping feature that reconnects people with the landscape context at a higher level.



Choice of Materials:



The research was focused on lightweight and clean white finish as my intention was to provide a serene and pure space where the land, water and sky could be framed by the pure forms of the buidling. The un-rhetorical nature also serves as a neutral background to the usually hectic urban life. and the precedents are: Altair apartments by Ian Moore and Yamaguchi Prefecture Pavilion by Kubota Architects.

The final material choices are: Steel structure with fibre cement boards (Please see construction drawing)

The steel structure can be built and dismantled with relative ease and provide needed ductility and strength. Composite fiber reinforced cement board, a lightweight and economical concrete material, gives the building its clen, simple planes and lines.

Say YES to architecture!

While feeling mopish early today, I picked up the book "Breaking Ground" by Daniel Libeskind. D.L. is an utmost optimist, which may be due to the fact that he has a happy and harmonious family and is always supported by his wife, children and most importantly ... his parents.

His early childhood impression on violent anti-Semitic society in postwar Eastern Europe and constant immigration to strange lands does not seem to cast any shadow on his heart. Although the gray and sorrowful pictures appear in some of his designs, such as the memory void in the Berlin Jewish Museum and the display of the underground slurry wall for the reconstruction of Ground Zero in New York City, the ultimate goal, however, is to bring new vision and spirit of hope to people.

In the face of difficulties and attacks, Libeskind expresses selfless resistance, believing in his capability to contributing to humanity, arousing both memory and hope, without a single thought of giving up. Such indomitable will is indeed admirable and praiseworthy. As he says, you can be a gloomy musician, a disanimated poet and create art in the subject of despair, but you cannot be an architect and pessimist at the same time. Essentially architecture is an optimistic profession; every step must carry belief and hope, from sketches on paper to three dimensional habitable space.

We must not lose our confidence or abandon our dream, but seek all possibilities to pursue our goals, indispensably with wisdom, courage and resolution. Not only can an affirmative outlook bring pleasure to us as architects during the creation process, but also to the people, to the world. So... let’s say YES to architecture!

Undeground Slurry Wall

of Memory Foundations

Googee Community Centre Final Presenation

Design Concept: Connecting with Nature in Motion

"There are no barriers between man and his enviornment, both on the inside and outside, because everything exists at the same time and is interconnected." ---- Florentine Sack

"Nature is always in motion, never at a standstill; if nature is to be loved, it must be caught while moving and in this way its aesthetic value must be appraised." ---- Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki


The site enjoys beautiful surrounding environment, the large area of green and the endless blue of the ocean and sky. My intent is to create a community center that connects the motion of human activities with the motion of nature. To be specific, the program encourages a serious of human activities and interactions on the site. This can bring opportunities to associate different activities with the environment, such as through diversifying views points and creating levels of platforms.


Main Issues Addressed:

1. Association with existing context
1) Respect to original site elements (connection
with grandstand, seating & playground)
2) Keep new structure within the site boundary
3) Avoid blocking views from grandstand
2. Levels of Visibility
1) Symbolic gesture (sculptural and dynamic façade)
2) Glimpese of activities from streets & the playground
3. Landscape Features
1) The continuity of landscape connecting streets,
the community centre and the oval
2) Sheltered green space & ookout platforms
4. Fluid Circulation
1) Easy access from all directions
2) For both game users & centre members
3) Ramp access to all levels
5. Interaction Among Users
1) Half stories - cross level visual connection
2) The use & control of transparency
3) Various meeting platforms

Hand Drawings:

External Facade

East & West Elevations:

Exercise 2 - Precedents Cross Section Study

A1 Presentation Boardsn

George Gittoes Newtown Art Gallery

Precedent

Jewish Museum in Berlin by Danial Libeskind

I am interested in how Libeskind encoded the questions of recording and remembering Jewish history in the structure/program. I've found that he used a series of metaphors for his creation of floor plan, voids and paths and even the shape of windows. My study has been mainly focusing on the relation between voids and paths.

As for circulation, the visitor must descend to the basement level and enter the new museum through an underground corridor. The path's walls and floor slope and converge; at its end are three routes: to the E. T A. Hoffman Garden, to the memorial Holocaust Void, and to a stair leading to the galleries. The monumental stair, tightly bounded between its walls, rises all the way through the building, crossed by angled concrete beams. Libeskind's name for the project is "Between the lines," and the title manifests in a perfectly straight stroke that penetrates the fragmented composition. Where this line slices the plan, the architect has left seven voids - metaphors for the absence and erasure of Jewish history in Berlin (Zeiger 2005).

Reference: Zeiger, M. (2005), New Museum Architecture: Innovative Buildings from Around the World, Thames & Hudson: London.

Study of the relation between voids and paths

Artist - George Gittoes

George Gittoes behind the camera

The artist I have in my mind for this gallery is George Gittoes, the internationally renowned Australian war artist. I didn’t make this decision until we met him on our graduation ceremony when he was honoured “Doctor of Letters DLitt”. What touched me was his 20 min impromptu speech after he received the award. The following is my reflection on Gittoes words and works.

Motivation/Intention:

First is why he’s doing what he’s doing, in other words why putting himself in the front line of war for the past decades? Gittoes answer: “it’s because of CARE”. Due to the increasing danger in those war zones, no media organizations want their journalists to risk their lives. In response to this, he felt this responsibility of bringing the true stories to the rest of the world with an artists’ perspective, portraying the feelings rather than bare facts that journalists reports. “Our job is to understand what it is to be human. No, it's not about what you can live with. Quite often it's what you can't live with. It's what you remind people about that is hard to live with and that's what my work does, I think. 

”

Medium:

“I don’t know what I am.”

He cannot be defined and therefore he is not confined. Gittoes uses a wide range of medium to depict what he sees, including painting, drawing, photography and films. ‘He travels, he witnesses, he creates. With driving curiosity, he crosses genres and eludes both the aesthetic and political stereotypes. The result is commanding art.’ ---Ihab Hassan

Compelling Visual Challenge:

Predictably the paintings that have emerged from Gittoes involvement possess an aggressive, but compelling, visual challenge utterly distinct from the work of artists who practice their art in the more secure, urban environments…” Art historian, Bernard Smith, ‘Modernism’s History’.

UNSW Press.1998. As Gittoes himself said “ I believe there is a role for contemporary art to challenge, rather than entertain. My work is confronting humanity with the darker side of itself.”

ABC Interview with George Gittoes:

http://www.abc.net.au/tv/sundayarts/txt/s1765976.htm

Artist with his work "Super Power Oil" 2004 Oil on Canvas

The Astronomer's House

Room and Narrative - Design Process

Influenes and Inspiration
I was inspired by Tadao Ando's work and theory and also Louis Kahn's article on Silence and Light. Additionally, A Pattern Language forms the basics for my design.

Tadao Ando:
Three factors are necessary for architecture to crystalize as architecture:
The first is "place": Place is the big premise to the "dynamic" of the building.
The second is simple "Geometry", like with the Pantheon - it is the base or skeleton that supports the actual form of the building. Sometimes as Platonic volumes, but most often as cubic frames. (more pure geometry).
And the third is "Nature".

Azuma House


Feeling of Privacy!!!

Simple Geometry and Private Courtyard



Church of Light







Louis Kahn:
Light to Silence, Silence to light, an ambiance of inspiration, in which the desire to be, to express crosses with the possible, crosses in the sanctuary of art. Its treasury knows no favorite, knows no style.

The most wonderful aspects of the indoors are the moods that light gives to space. Structure is the maker of light. Even a room which must be dark needs at least a crack of light to know how dark it is. We should not forget the endlessly changing qualities of natural light, in which a room is a different room every second of the day.
Everything must begin with poetry.




Compared with Tadao Ando who deals with thin curtains of light using the gaps between walls and floors, Kahn's control of light seems more generous, as there are normally large openings.



A Pattern Language:
Important Chapters:
House for One person - Several alcoves surrounding main room
Indoor Sunlight - Wake with Sun
The flow through rooms - better to be a loop
Stair case as a a stage - make the bottom of the stairs flare out, widen steps, comfortable to sit on
Zen view - put small windows at places of transition and don't spoil the view with huge windows
Bed Alcove - Privacy and Low Ceiling Height
Low Doorway - moment of passage, feeling of transition

Light and Life

A reflection on the film ‘My Architect’

Tracing your footsteps in the hushed world,

I see your shadow casting on my face and my soul.

I hear the echoes of your voice, 

The whispery sound I used to be familiar with, when I was a child.

Here, light and shadow transform along with the time,

Day after day, I see invisible presence

A thread of warmness, a glimmer of hope

The light cast nothing else on the walls and floors

But, the feeling has been deeply engraved in the heart.

It was beautiful and unforgettable memories

Isn't this just as our life? 

We come to this world in a hurry, 

Running through time,

And one day we leave in a hurry.

Just as after the wind has passed,

It leaves no rustling sound among the trees; 

After the geese have gone, 

The pond doesn't retain their reflection.

This is the stillness of the world.

So why chasing after fame and fortune?

After all, we are the light, 

Devoting ourselves into responsibilities should be enough.

 

Kahn's love for all things 

Has been deeply embedded in the his buildings.

Some people describe that

Architecture is the solidification of music.

We may say that it is also solidified love. 

This love is a broad love.

Love for nature, 

Love for mankind

Love for civilization,

Just like how light chooses to illuminate everything, 

Empowering wind and rain to breed the land and lives.

 

Because of love, 

We choose not to be fooled by the material world, 

Not to follow superficial social trend. 

Like his buildings, Kahn is strong and persistent. 

Ultimately, architecture becomes a tangible expression of his love. 

Even though he has gone, we are forever touched.

"Void"

Interestingly enough, there is a particular chapter in Le Corbusier's Hands about VOID

The shape of the voids was thought in the same way as the shape of filled-in parts. They complemented each other. The void was not a residual part. It was also architecture. Sometimes it was even more loaded with meaning than the full form merely serving as its envelope. In the "villa-apartments" of the Unites d'Habitation, it is the void that has a positive form. That is also the case in the hall of Assembly in Chandigarh, in the corridors of the monastery of La Tourette, and inside its church. The Villa Savoye continues to be one of the most beautiful works by Le Corbusier for many reasons: one of them is the extraordinary balance between full and empty volumes - the rigorous complementarity between them - where the void is a positive form inside the envelope defining it.

The importance given to the void fills the architecture with meaning since it is when we succeed at creating a void in our inner life that we can experience it in its fullness, in all its richness and fecundity.

"We work the clay in the shape of a vase, for it is precisely where there is nothing that the effectiveness of the vase resides. We make openings for doors and windows to make a house, for it is precisely where there is nothing that the effectiveness of the house reside. Thus, we think that we benefit from things that are tangible, but it is precisely where we do not perceive anything that the true effectiveness resides."

'Le Corbusier' and 'The Old Man'

Le Corbusier's Hands by Andre Wogenscky is a poetic biography of Le Corbusier, the master and pioneer of Modern Architecture. The book is beyond architecture, more about revealing and depicting the master's spiritual world which was the foundation of his approach to architecture.

While reading the book, I couldn't help myself constantly referring the image of Le Corbusier to that of Santiago, the protagonist of The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. To me, his dedication to architecture and unremitting efforts in exploring the field and tackling problems is almost identical to the old man who never had a single thought to give up fishing during the ordeal, neither when conquering the Marlin fish nor when protecting the Marlin from the sharks. Their spirit may be well expressed in the old man's words: ' Think of only one thing. That which I was born for... A man can be destroyed but not defeated.' This spirit also lies in Le Corbusier's obsession with drawing meanders. As Wogenscky commented, 'the meander is the very image of his life, made of unrelenting effort, going around the obstacles, but without renouncing, eating into things, always eating into things so as to go deeper and find their passage through. Then, leaving behind the meanders; the disappointments, all bitter feelings and malicious events, going through it all and finding life again, perpetual birth, joy.'

More often, it's people's nature to avoid challenges, but Le Corbusier and the story of the old man demonstrated the spirit of constantly challenging ourselves. Seneca who worked with Le Corbusier said: "It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we don't dare that they are difficult." Why do we choose to do so when we've got other easier alternatives? The answer is to brake through and make a difference and this is how civilization appeared, how different fields have proceeded and achieved today's success.

After studying architecture for the past few weeks, I've found the more I get into it, the more immense the knowledge becomes. I wish I could have the spirit of 'Le Corbusier' and the 'Old man' to overcome the handwork and enjoy what I do. The old man's voice echoes in my head~~~ 'It is rougher where you are going until you make the shore.'

Villa Savoye - Finished Model

Model by Feifei Feng and Laura Parengkuan

Villa Savoye - Model Making Process

Beginning - Ground Floor Construction


Almost Finished Ground Floor Construction


1st Floor Construction


Working on Window Details (I see music notes!!!)

Ramp!!! My favorite part of the house


Solidity of the Ramp


It took us a whole day, but it's worth it.


Stairs - Again time consuming but fun process


Model by Feifei Feng and Laura Parengkuan

Design Now! National Graduate Exhibition

I'd like to show this very important project- the "Go Art District" (Beijing, China) (2007) - the final year project of my design course. It is by doing this project, I seriously fell in love with architecture. It is by doing it, I got to know my supervisor Richard and a few other great architects who encouraged me to study architecture.

Well, thanks to these people's help and inspiration on this project, I was selected as one of the 18 finalists for this year's Design Now - National Graduate Exhibition. My design is still at a conceptual stage, but it is a suggestion that I'd like to put forward about Chinese architecture.


Design Concept

The project is to design an art district in Bejing which requires both living space and exhibition space for artists. My work is inspired by Go, a Chinese traditional board game, having originated in China around 4,000 years ago. I chose this as the concept because of the interactive patterns that the game produces. It begins with an empty board from which white and black then build up and live together in a way determined by the strategies of the players involved. In this project, I wanted to interpret this 2D interactive and complex pattern into a 3D modular housing system.

Integration and encirclement, with public and private spaces mingled together. This 3D ordered chaos challenges our normal perspective of looking at the functions of spaces. It also provides a unique experience to the end-users, which include artists and their audience.

Truck Theatre Design Proposal for East Timor Performance Group

A design project I did at COFA before undertaking architecutre at FBE.

This project won the Omnium Creative Network Award (ReDesign and ReConstruct proposal award). I enjoyed doing this small-scaled theatre design where lots of thoughts were put into designers' social and environmental role.

This portable stage set is provided as a kit and designed to fit in the truck that the performance group is currently using. I was inspired by the local construction methods and materials used in East Timor. The kit consists of a series of bamboo sticks with specifically designed dimensions and can be quickly assembled and disassembled using traditional mortise and tenon joint methods.

Instruction booklets are provided and are suitable for different literacy levels.

Instruction Booklet Content

Beta House (Shipping Container Living Space)

Contemplation Garden - Selected work for Shanghai International Design Biennaie,China

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East meets West
in a contemplative space
for an inner city site in Sydney

In the velocitised urban world of the twenty-first century, it is becoming more important than ever to find the time and space to simply sit quietly and watch the world go by. This design for a narrow strip of parkland close to a major highway provides a sense of tranquility and peace for those who sit in it. It is also a reminder to the passing motorists of the importance of taking the time to sit in the very slow lane of life. Combining references to both traditional East Asian and contemporary design, this simple space is imbued with a sense of timeless harmony at the centre of the modern vortex.

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Selected into “Hyper Design”

international students' exhibition of Shanghai Biennale