U.Va. Architecture School to Host Woltz Symposium on Urban Metabolism

The University of Virginia School of Architecture will host the 2013 John E. Woltz Symposium, “QuasiObjects/WorldObjects/HyperObjects: New Classifications for the Urban Metabolism” this weekend at Campbell Hall.

Scott Lash, a project leader in the Goldsmiths Media Research Programme at the University of London, will give the public keynote address, “Forms and Life and the Theory of the Object: Elements of Urban Metabolism,” on Friday at 5 p.m. in Campbell Hall, room 153. Lash’s recent books include “Critique of Information” (2002), “Global Culture Industry” (2007) and “Intensive Culture” (2010).

Kim Tanzer, dean of the Architecture School and Edward E. Elson Professor of Architecture, will provide opening remarks. A reception will follow at 6:30 p.m. in the East Wall Gallery.

This year’s Woltz Symposium was organized and curated by Architecture School faculty members Nana Last, associate professor in architecture; Shiqiao Li, professor of architecture; and Jorg Sieweke, assistant professor of landscape architecture.

First held in 2001, every three years the Woltz Symposium generates the opportunity to promote discourse between the school’s students and faculty and leaders on emerging topics where landscape architecture and architecture overlap with the humanities, sciences and art.

These symposia are held in memory of John E. Woltz, a 1947 graduate of U.Va.’s College of Arts & Sciences and a longtime friend of the School of Architecture.

The goal of the 2013 symposium is to frame a discussion around three “objects” that can serve as new classifications for the idea of urban metabolism – the model to describe and analyze the flows of the materials and energy within cities.

With a growing concern about climate and atmospheric change, urban metabolism has served as a model in exploring sustainability in global urban environments, and has provided a unified viewpoint to encompass all of the activities of a city.

Roundtable workshops initiated by invited guests will take place Saturday morning and afternoon in the Garden Room Hotel E, West Range. Seating is limited and requires registration. Contact Timothy Kelley at tek2jk@virginia.edu to reserve a seat.

The invited panelists include national and foreign academics and practitioners in the fields of urban design, photography, landscape architecture, architectural theory, media and political science.

Among the panelists are: Dirk Sijmons, curator of the Sixth International Architecture Biennale in Rotterdam, Netherlands; Claire Pentecost, professor in photography at the School of Art Institute in Chicago; Niels Albertsen, research professor at Aarhus School of Architecture and co-director for the Centre for Strategic Urban Research; Ryan Bishop, professor of global art and politics at the Winchester School of Art, University of Southampton; Seth Denizen, a recent U.Va. graduate in landscape architecture and currently a researcher in the University of Hong Kong Division of Landscape Architecture; and Martin Felsen, principal of UrbanLab, a collaborative architecture and urban design firm based in Chicago.

U.Va. Architecture School faculty members will respond to the panelists’ presentations. These respondents include Sheila Crane, associate professor in architectural history; Robin Dripps, professor in architecture; Teresa Gali, associate professor in landscape architecture; Beth Meyer, associate professor in landscape architecture; Matthew Jull, assistant professor in architecture; and Bill Sherman, associate professor in architecture.

A reception at 4 p.m. will follow the roundtable workshops.