ADS3: Metabolising the Built Environment
Kristofers Scipanovs
Kristofers Scipanovs was born in Riga, Latvia. Having moved to the UK in 2007 Kristofers’ design practice has been significantly shaped by both; the post soviet conditions of Latvia and his experience of living in the UK.
Prior to his studies at the RCA, Kris completed a Bachelor's Degree in Architecture at the Leicester School of Architecture, followed by a year at a London practice, where he had an opportunity to work on a range of projects, including, but not limited to: a university lab building, community visitors centre, library and large scale master plans. Work on these projects shaped his experience of architecture practice, providing him with a base which he decided to develop at the RCA.
Since the beginning of his studies at the Royal College of Art, School of Architecture, Kris has explored a wide variety of topics. In his first year project with ADS8 he researched spatial implications of data legislations on the post-Soviet borders and the implications of personal data security and surveillance as well as speculated a Data Centre in the extraterritorial space of an embassy. His next project with ADS3 looked at the post-industrial metabolism of Vanadium and the human systems which control it, leading to an environment of slow and invisible violence. His thesis project speculates a digital platform focused on communicating changes to the metabolic flow of vanadium controlled by human activity. Resulting in a proposition of a simulation, which forecasts the metabolic flows of a substance based on the activity of human and non-human stakeholders. The intent of the project is to become a design tool, which shifts the environmental conversations of spatial design.
Contact
Tel: +44 7947 842151
Instagram: @krisscip
Visit the new RCA Architecture folio website
Create your own folio mixtape
Vanadium Landscapes is a speculative project that aims to become a tool through which the complex metabolic relationships of substances become communicated. The project focuses on Vanadium, a substance ubiquitous in the post-industrial environment. Through anthropogenic activity vanadium concentrations in nature have increased by 170%, contributing to an environment of increased pollution that both, human and non-human bodies flow through. In this environment, Vanadium becomes a substance of duality and contradiction, both a poison and a cure.
Approaching this environment as a new normal, the project looks to map the increased concentration of (V) caused by human activity and links it to the human systems that control the landscape. The project speculates a digital platform focused on communicating changes to the metabolic flow of vanadium controlled by human activity. The simulation turns values of human systems, such as company ownership, into ‘input’ controlled by the ‘USER’ becoming a tool through which different scenarios of the Vanadium Landscape can be communicated. The Simulation is explored in the animation. Designing the relationship between the different figures of vanadium concentration extracted from scientific studies and linking them to the human systems that control them is the architecture of the project. Instead of columns, the project has sliders.
The project locates itself in Russia, the second-largest vanadium producer in the world, and looks at Evraz, one of the largest metallurgical companies in the country. Following the supply chain of vanadium, the Russian landscape becomes abstracted into a series of anthropogenic systems and boundaries, becoming values which the Vanadium Landscape simulation is based on.
Approaching the mine as a point of conjuncture between the natural flow of vanadium and the anthropogenic use of the substance. Russian Mining Legislation sees Subsoil substance as State Property. Only once the substance crosses the legal boundary of the soil layer, it enters private ownership. In the case of Evraz, its ownership is further broken down into shares, voting rights and representative companies. The substance body defined by human systems of legislation, abstracting the physical body of vanadium into values.
In April of 2017, Denis Manturov Russia’s minister of industry and trade announced the government's plan to expand the state’s production of vanadium:
He stated, “Russia has the world’s largest deposits of vanadium ore. According to state plans, production should be significantly expanded at the majority of Russia’s largest vanadium fields over the coming years.”
This Statement highlights Vanadiums importance in the body of anthropogenic systems. This statement followed an announcement by three of the largest shareholders of Evraz: that they are selling off their shares in the company.
The Simulation aims to link shifts in human systems, to changes in vanadium levels in the atmosphere, soil and other bodies. By USER taking control over these inputs, the simulation becomes an interactive tool, allowing the communication of the complex environments of large corporations or states and the intricate effects that they have on different bodies of the vanadium landscape. Through this, the Vanadium Landscape becomes a tool, which can be used to design and shape space through shifts in human activity.
Forecasting the effects of human stakeholders and becoming a tool to design through scenarios in the space of the substance, vanadium landscape hopes to shape space through thinking through the metabolic flow of the pollutant.
As Vanadium is experiencing a transition, and it becomes the focus of more research, more utilisation for its unique properties are being found. This simulated tool would provide a digital double for the metabolic flows of vanadium and expose the human and non-human stakeholders which shape the Vanadium Landscape, forecasting the metabolic environment of substances.
The Kachkanar Mine Digital Double
(V) Forest
Kachkanar Vanadium Landscapes
Approaching this environment as a new normal, the project looks to map the increased concentration of (V) caused by human activity and links it to the human systems that control the landscape.The project speculates a digital platform focused on communicating changes to the metabolic flow of vanadium controlled by human activity.The simulation turns values of human systems, such company ownership, into ‘input’ controlled by the ‘USER’ becoming a tool through which different scenarios of the Vanadium Landscape can be communicated.Designing the relationship between the different figures of vanadium concentration extracted from scientific studies and linking them to the human systems that control them is the architecture of the project. Instead of columns, the project has sliders.
Medium:
Vanadium Landscapes SimulationSize:
00:06:00mins
Vanadium Landscape — Vanadium Landscape — An image imagining the post-industrial landscape of anthropogenic vanadium. This image explores the different contexts that vanadium flows through its role in anthropogenic systems. From the global scale of resource distribution to the human cell, the image speculates the relationships between these spaces through the lens of the substance.
Vanadium Flow — Vanadium Flow — The image shows the relationship between the different land bodies in the post-industrial metabolic flow of vanadium. From the Kachkanar mine to the processing plant in Nizhny Tagil to the chemical plant in Tula, Vanadium experiences boundaries defined by human systems.
Medium:
Vanadium Landscapes Diagrams
V Metabolism
Abstraction of V
V Digital Double
The origin of the Pharmakon is a synthesis of remedy, poison and scapegoat. In Plato’s Phaedrus dialogue; writing is offered as a remedy for memory loss, but refused as it would not remedy the memory loss but merely act as a way of reminding. As vanadium is metabolised at natural levels it proves to be essential in various bodily functions. In the cell, represented at the top left of the drawing, vanadium compounds act to promote entry to S-phase of p53-dependant apoptosis, this can be responsible for tumor reduction. However, an increased inhalation of Vanadium Pentoxide can lead to cell oxidation and DNA damage, resulting in an increased risk of cancer. A single element responsible for the prevention and the cause of cancer. Vanadium possessing the same Ambivalence for cancer as writing for memory loss.
Naturally, vanadium is concentrated in the Earth’s crust, atmosphere as well as its waters, but never found in its elemental form, always associated with other substances. It flows through natural systems of mechanical and chemical weathering, oceanic aerosol, volcanic emissions and dissolving sediment, crossing boundaries through reaction into the food chain. Vanadium is an essential element for biological enzymatic reactions in soil, but at higher concentration proves to be toxic. Current levels created by anthropogenic activities account for 1.7 times vanadium released by natural processes. Pollution occurs mainly around mining/smelting sites and in urban areas, both release Vanadium Pentoxide which has been shown to be toxic. Choosing the Arctic as a point of conjuncture for organic and inorganic Vanadium flows, the activities in the arctic are closely linked to the metabolic pathways of the element. These Research images show the anthropogenic flows of vanadium through its many anthropogenic contexts.