Maria Kochneva: Border- The translucent hinge

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'' I was focusing on the formation of border conditions, on the processes occurring within the border itself and systems, which it is separating. The initial generic hypothesis was extracted from the observation of borders in the contemporary world. Looking at borders in different scales and diverse expressions, leads to the idea of ambivalence. Their very existence, function, material expression, everything is dual. The project consists of series of diagrams and models aiming to articulate various issues which are intrinsic to the border in architecture. In general, focus is revolving around attempting to understand the nature of border, its qualities in geometrical sense and its impact on the entities, which initially provoked its appearance. The architectural reference for the project is Renzo Piano’s IBM Travelling Pavilion, from which I’ve derived an instrument for proceeding with the experimentation. The space, which is produced in that pavilion is translucent, it is created as embodied immateriality, which refers back to the border’s ambivalence. The mechanism of that experience, of both existence and non-existence, is based on repetition, geometry of basic unit and its material quality of transparency. It made me wonder, if the system is deprived of material properties how through geometry and spatial organization the same effect can be achieved? In order to move forward, I looked at the basic unit of the pavilion – pyramid – as hinge surface, which is like border, connecting and separating inside and outside, stabilizing on different levels and  enabling flexibility, relative shift and fluctuation.  Border studies and analysis of IBM Travelling Pavilion allowed me to establish a geometrical system of interdependent relations between border-hinge-surface and 2 basic datums. The system has a potential to investigate diverse conditions occurring. It helps to define the border, to trace its “life cycle” and observe its impact on initial entities. Thus, border is no more “something in-between”, it has capacity not only to react, but also to act, it’s not a mere surface, but a space in itself.I was testing the system regarding different pairs of spatial qualities, such as parallelity and perpendicularity, symmetry and asymmetry, continuity and discontinuity, void and solid. All of them were looked at as possible features of translucency which echoes generic duality of border and architectural effect of IBM.  Interrelated series of digital and physical models were exploring the transitional directionalities of datums, provoked by hinge iterations, articulations of datums’ intersection, or touch, where the hinge is collapsing into the void or triggers the whole system to flip back to the initial state on a sub-scale, and ways to stabilize the elements through manipulating of interdependent symmetries and asymmetries. These studies provided the basis for delineating of architectural hypothesis, or assortment of tools which will be a framework for the second year and final design proposal. The border, which I define as spatial hinge-surface, is able to synthesize spatial qualities within itself and outside, generate transition between opposite systems, enable interaction and create overall effect of translucency. It is an organizational and geometrical control point. ,,(Maria Kochneva)