Drawing Languages
Languages is a series of research, started by Prof. Teresa Galí-Izard and now developed within the Chair of Being Alive, on the topic of the translation of scientific knowledge about living entities into diagrammatic drawings as a tool of design in Landscape Architecture.
We draw knowledge from scientists specialized in soils, plants, environments, etc, and re-interpret this information into special diagrams that support landscape designers for design processes. Through the translation into a drawing, we select the information that helps us to understand the internal behaviour of those entities, their interaction as parts of complex systems, and their potentialities; and therefore, the information that defines the different dynamics on which we base the design.
Drawing Languages is and will be a work in progress. The process of translation is continuously evolving — our sources grow, and so do our tools. As a first step, we work with hand-made and digital simple 2D drawings, shaping a sketch of the information we consider essential for the design and how this could be represented. These initial diagrams, referred as the Manual Translation, are followed by a phase of Algorithmic Translation where we parametrise the components of the drawing.
The aim of these phases of translation is to reach the automation in drawing the diagrams, seeking for a comfortable and useful way of integrating this scientific knowledge into the design process. For this purpose, we are developing a set of tools hosted inside the 3D modelling software Rhinoceros and the parametric platform Grasshopper.
As a way of collecting our thoughts, a documentary of the progress on Languages will be published on our website in the shape of separated articles, including translations of the students.
