This group will explore the principles of periphery that have permeated into a wide range of areas of study and practice in the European city, transforming the way we approach architectural research and discourse and spatial-temporal relations. The concept of the periphery-sometimes called the non-city, the edge city, generic city, junkspace, terrain vague- are concepts and key terms that are frequently used indistinctly to define a similar phenomenon. You will aim to define the characteristics of the periphery today in architectural discourse and critique the work of contemporary European architects (Koolhaas, Rossi, Ignasi and Manuel de Sola-Morales, Boeri, Herreros, Moneo, Abalos, Rogers, MVDRV, etc) and to explore the relationship between architectural theory and discourse and architectural production. Students are encouraged to choose a site of periphery and analyse it using the theoretical approaches, projects, and discourses put forward by the contemporary European architects mentioned above to then develop a theoretical taxonomy of that particular periphery (be it site, project, building, or infrastructure). The basis for this work is the relationship between architecture and the city based on the work of Rafael Moneo in the concept of theoretical anxiety as a tool for work, with focus on the use of modern peripheral tools such as photography, narratives, to explore this hitherto in greater details.
