ADS8: Data Matter: Digital Networks, Data Centres & Posthuman Institutions
Wilson Tam
Wilson W S Tam, is a London based architectural designer, he gained his MA in Architecture (Part II) at the Royal College of Art (2018-2020). During his time at the RCA he conducted research-based projects, with a practice that expanded beyond pure architectural and spatial interrogations, encompassing social and political implication.
He completed his thesis project ‘Disappearance of the Bloggers’ in ADS 8, under Dr. Marina Otero Verzier, Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli and Kamil Hilmi Dalkir. His research project investigated the symbolic and hegemonic social and spatial implication of digital infrastructure, political power and the internet, in the social and geo-political context of Cairo, Egypt. With the rising authoritarian powers and oppression of human rights through-out the extremely contested region of the Middle-East, the project is developed in a cross-disciplinary approach, through correspondence and interviews with human rights activists, cyber-security specialists and sociology academics. The intervention is presented through a speculative narrative as a form of documentary but also an encryption.
He has also completed the project ‘Posh Ghost Town’ in ADS 11 in his first year of the MA, under Renaud Haerlingen and Rotor (rotordb.org), where he studied empty, unfinished and unoccupied residential buildings in the city of London as an emerging spatial phenomenon as a result of capitalist consumption. The research proposed, through the ‘Re-Use’ of Milford Towers, a pilot scheme to rethink the value and preservation of architecture, in a wave of reckless demolition of 60s-70s Brutalist social housings.
Wilson’s work and practice expands beyond pure architectural and spatial interrogations, encompassing social and political implication.
Fundamentally as a spatial designer by training, he is most interested in reading urban fragments and residual spaces as abstract components, in dissecting and understanding the ‘in-between’ architectural and urban conditions that we inhabit. From his architectural education and professional training, he developed a strong practice combining his 3-dimnesional analytical skills and digital visualization. His practice also experiments with different design methodologies, where he is interested in the relationship between design process and the spatial qualities that it produces.
Prior to joining the RCA, Wilson has obtained extensive work experience internationally, such as RAD (ww.rad.hk) where he was part of the design team located in Hong Kong for multiple master planning competition proposals and the realization of two commercial office projects. In collaboration with Orient Occident Atelier (www.ooa.design), he was involved in civil projects in rural Cambodia and was responsible for the architectural design of a 21st century modern factory in China, currently under construction.
Academically, he worked briefly as a Research Assistant at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Hong Kong (www.arch.hku.hk). Having previously contributed to research exhibition and publications with PWFerretto (www.pwferretto.com).
Currently based in London, he is working as a freelance architectural designer for Arc-A (www.arc-a.com), recently completing a small-scale commercial installation in Greenwich, London, and is now working on a number of residential projects, from concept design to construction detail.
Avery Gordon, Ghostly Matters
This project instigates an organized resistance against the oppression of freedom of speech in the social and geo-political context of Cairo, Egypt, through the navigation and dissemination of data by means of an alternative digital infrastructure.
The research draws parallels through cross-examining two monumental events in Egyptian contemporary history: The 2011 Egyptian Revolution, and the Construction of the New Administrative Capital.
The research begins with an analysis of the 2011 Egyptian Revolution, not only as an attempt to confront the unresolved tensions and holes left-behind on the fabric of the city from past revolutions, but also as an ideological movement which rose from activism through social media platforms. The movement manifested in the physical space of the city of Cairo, due to a reverse-mobilizing effect of a state-imposed internet ‘kill-switch’. The work exposes the vulnerability of the high-volume, low-diversity structure of the infrastructural landscape, a system that is built on corruption and nepotism in former president Mubarak’s regime.
The research examines the construction of the proposed New Administrative capital through the lens of ownership and the financial investment of new surveillance technologies. Despite socio-economic propaganda, the city is being constructed to create higher barrier to prevent both physical and digital forms of social activism, and continuing Egypt’s trend of building new cities instead of confronting old ones.
The research collected data through correspondence and interviews with human rights activists, cyber-security specialists and sociology academics, some have had personal involvement in the development in Egypt’s politics, these first hand testimonies acted as foundational evidence in developing the proposition.
The proposition speculated on existing urban and digital conditions of the city and applied the concept of Disappearance as a metaphorical and figurative design methodology. Proposing an infrastructure that is based on the movement of individuals and reconfigurability of localised mesh networks, functioning in parallel to the existing infrastructures.
The body of research is presented through a speculative narrative through the lens of the mechanical and material performances of the proposed devices. A documentative representation that re-imagines aesthetics of inhabitation in the urban environment of Cairo, the project therefore questions the role of politics in digital infrastructure and a critical reflection on new spaces for political activism.