Maps of what might be: A dozen works on ideas and possibilities

Abstract

The aim here is to investigate some of the relations between ways of ordering and representing knowledge in two fields – architecture and cartography. This is undertaken by examining some of the ideas generated in the making of 12 small model pavilions. I call them ‘epistemological pavilions’ as they are an effort to map knowledge of space and place in a physical form. As with cartographic maps these models embody knowledge. In this case their production is not often concerned with embodying knowledge of extant places, although sometimes they endeavor to illuminate relationships and conditions of built objects. The pavilion models embody the knowledge of their designer-maker, but do so in a projective manner, as designing concerns what might be, in the context of what is. These models thus occupy a territory that has overlaps with paper maps; they can also be read as speculative maps of what could be. Selected issues dealt with in the models that resonate with issues in mapping are explored in an effort to relate the two knowledge domains.