Journal examines contemporary architecture theory, philosophy

Challenging convention
Journal examines contemporary architecture theory, philosophy

BY JESSICA STARK
Rice News staff

Rice School of Architecture (RSA) students earned a competitive grant from the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts to publish Manifold Magazine, a journal that examines contemporary architecture theory, its roots and its future. The magazine’s mission: to challenge convention by asking questions about theory and design.

The four former and current students behind the publication — Izabel Gass, Etien Santiago, Nicholas Risteen and Joseph Lim — set out to develop a forum for an interuniversity community to discuss, inspire and prompt critical thinking about architecture.

“We founded this magazine in response to the increasing marginalization of philosophical thought in architecture,” said Gass, editor-in-chief. “In recent years, intellectual resources have been put on hold, and practitioners have stopped exploring theory, choosing instead to not ask questions and do what has already been done.”

Founded in May 2007, the magazine seeks to fill the void in current architecture publications by featuring essays and interviews that openly explore the value and purpose of philosophical inquiry. Among other things, it has addressed the relationship between critical theory and political justice and has challenged the ”postcritical” movement in architecture.

“There are exciting new and ongoing debates taking place in all intellectual realms, but those just aren’t being taken up by architects,” said Santiago ’06, associate editor. “We want to change that.”

Funded by a Dr. Bill Wilson Student Initiative Grant, Manifold’s second issue hit newsstands last week in architecture schools around the country. The recent Graham Foundation award will fund at least three future issues, which are sponsored by Lars Lerup, dean of RSA and the William Ward Watkin Professor of Architecture.

Because of the funding and support, the first two issues of the magazine are free to architecture students outside of Rice, and the Manifold staff hopes to distribute future issues at a much larger scale.

ETIEN SANTIAGO

“We really want this to be accessible to all architecture students because it is important that we get diverse opinions,” Gass said. “Our field is experiencing an era when self-criticality is lacking. And that criticality is so important in innovation and evolution.”

Gass and Santiago said that the support they found at RSA has been invaluable to them as they launched the magazine.

“Dean Lerup and Associate Dean John Casbarian have been enormously supportive of the project, even allocating an office for us in Anderson Hall,” Gass said. “The support of RSA has been critical in the success of our magazine.”

The idea for the project stemmed from conversations in seminar classes with Sanford Kwinter, associate professor of architecture, and other RSA professors, such as Nana Last and Christopher Hight.  

“We want to expand on the dialogues happening in theory classes,” Santiago said. “There, we do look at the bigger questions, such as the impact of the social and political on design. Architecture is much richer when we ask these kinds of questions.”

Gass, who earned bachelor’s degrees in art history and architecture in 2006, plans to stay at Rice to shepherd the development of the magazine. Though all the editors are currently from Rice, Gass hopes to involve students at other schools too.

The magazine is one vehicle for a larger, namesake project, “Manifold,” which Gass describes as a think tank to facilitate philosophical inquiry within architecture schools today. In addition to the print journal, there is a Web site to enable conversations between students and selected faculty. For Manifold, Gass received the 2008 Rice Visionary Project award, selected by Lerup and Casbarian.

Manifold Magazine is available in Anderson Hall, Room 238, or online at www.manifoldmagazine.com.