Young Architects Program International

From the agora to the Roman Forum to the boulevard, architecture has provided the platforms for civic, social, and political interaction. Our contemporary mediums of exchange transcend the physical spaces we inhabit via information networks accessed through screens and devices. Architecture is tasked with discovering new relations of the public as they relate to organization, situations and perception.

Experimenting with Collectivity inside the Institution
The introduction of the EXPO 1 program marks a shift in the YAP towards participatory situations that seed new forms of collectivity. Our proposal for the MoMA PS1 YAP is a new type of forum that explores the nature of collectivity within our contemporary culture through moments of encounter, sharing, and disruption. Understood as an experimental prototype for the construction of the new commons, the PS1 Forum is composed of three primary elements: a polycentric form, sensorial walls, and a location-sensitive social platform app. The combination of these elements blurs and questions inherited forms of exchange, allowing individuals, collectives, and experts to interact in unforeseen and serendipitous ways. Thirty-foot-tall blades made of recycled plastic create a series of thresholds and membranes that define a variety of spatial situations radically transforming the use of the courtyard. The quantity of material used for its construction is equivalent to 100,000 plastic bottles, or one minute of American plastic consumption each day.

The Future
The project will have an online presence where all discussions in the PS1 Forum will be accumulated over the course of the summer. After the closing of the MoMA PS1 Warm Up, the forum will break apart and be relocated into different public spaces throughout the world, testing the possibilities of space in enabling new forms of conversation.

Text submitted by Leong Leong