Human / Nature / Technology:
Architectural Relationships through the Lens of more-than-human Epistemologies, Degrowth Practices and Occulture
Is there such a thing as post-anthropocentric architecture? The building industry is one of the biggest material extractors on the planet and infrastructurally deeply entangled in the Anthropocene and Capitalocene. Buildings are human-centric by definition and are designed to exclude all kinds of others: unwanted weather phenomena, animals, plants, dirt, smells, sounds and other humans. Current European and technophile construction regulations force architects and clients alike to contribute to the continuation of unsustainable material extraction. Required wall thicknesses of up to 60cm exclude the human body from its natural environment and perpetuate the false mindset of a human-nature dichotomy. The PhD project aims to relook at human-energy relationships from a physical and metaphysical point of view and to employ degrowth design methods as a practical tool for sustainability. Technology is seen as an infrastructural problem and as a tool for individual agency. The experimental production of drawings, objects and buildings aims to generate a malleable and open-ended knowledge field rather than one final answer.