Freefall is a series organised by AA 4th year Moad Musbahi & AA graduate Konstantina Koulouri. The series looks at the multiplication of ‘lines’ that govern daily life, from the tangible frame around an image or the building of a wall; to the more intangible construction of juridical and disciplinary borders. Freefall in this operates as a way to construct trajectories, in the form of conversations, questioning the ground upon which disciplinary divisions acquire their intelligibility.
By questioning how disciplinary definitions and exclusions are made, the series hopes to re-examine how a discipline concerned with 'space' can operate between and in mediation with the techniques of law and techno-scientific advancements.
After the visual and discursive display, Prof Linda Mulcahy and John Palmesino will provide first responses with the intention to open up the ensuing conversation.
Richard K. Sherwin is the Wallace Stevens Professor of Law and Director of the Visual Persuasion Project at New York Law School. He is currently a Visiting Fellow at Fitzwilliam College and a Research Scholar at the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Science and Humanities at Cambridge University. His scholarly writings explore the rich and varied relationship between law and culture, focusing in particular on legal narrative, visual communication, the legitimation process, and the genealogy of law’s sovereignty. Professor Sherwin has served as a frequent commentator on television, radio, and in print media, and was featured in director Jeremiah Zagar’s acclaimed documentary film “Captivated: The Trials of Pamela Smart” (HBO 2014).
Susan Schuppli is an artist and researcher based in the UK, whose work examines material evidence from war and conflict to environmental disasters. Current work explores the ways in which toxic ecologies from nuclear accidents and oil spills to the dark snow of the arctic are producing an “extreme image” archive of material wrongs. Creative projects have been exhibited throughout Europe, Asia, Canada, and the US. She has published widely within the context of media and politics and is author of the forthcoming book, Material Witness (MIT Press Autumn 2018). In 2016 she received the ICP Infinity Award for Critical Writing and Research. Schuppli is Reader and Director of the Centre for Research Architecture, Goldsmiths University of London and was previously Senior Research Fellow on the Forensic Architecture project.
Linda Mulcahy is a Professor of socio-legal studies at the LSE where she is also the Director of the School’s new PhD Academy. Having gained qualifications in law, sociology and art history her work has a strong inter-disciplinary flavour. It focuses on the dynamics of disputes and their resolution and adopts a grounded approach to understanding how people experience the legal system. In recent years she has been researching the architecture of courthouses and more particularly what it is that courthouses symbolise in the civic landscape and the sorts of behaviours they facilitate. She is the author of numerous publications including Legal Architecture: Justice, Due Process and the Place of Law (2011) Routledge and is the process of completing a book with Emma Rowden on the notions of democratic courthouses and the jurisprudence of design.
John Palmesino is the co-founder of Territorial Agency, an independent organisation that combines contemporary architecture and urbanism for integrated spatial transformation. Their projects include the Museum of Oil with Greenpeace, the Anthropocene Observatory, and North. He is Diploma Unit Master at the AA, where he also teaches on the MA History and Critical Thinking. He teaches at the Centre for Research Architecture, Goldsmiths. He was Advising Researcher at Jan Van Eyck Academie Maastricht. He is a founding member of multiplicity, an international network of researchers. He has lead the research of ETH Zurich–Studio Basel.