Far is Near

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RESEARCH BACKGROUND
'Constellations: A large number of small drawings' coincided with the 'Drawing Out' conference organized by RMIT University and University of Arts London. Work was selected from artists and designers working in diverse disciplines, and ranged from schematic studies to exquisite drawings of high artistic merit, from preparatory sketches to professional plans. The architectural drawings exhibited, from different styles and periods, ranged from older, beautifully-rendered drawings to contemporary mind maps, from hand-drawn images to computer-assisted designs.

RESEARCH CONTRIBUTION
Far Is Near tests an alternative mapping technique consisting of abstract forms of representation at different scales, both 'far' and 'near'. These drawings, which document essential conditions of a site and translate them from their natural situation into a new, more artificial state, are an investigation into the evocative, as both a pre-design reference and an influence on the design process. Specifically, they are analytical studies of the vegetation patterns that inform the existing site, and they investigate the role that the vegetation may have in relation to the design by documenting its constitutive natural elements at both a large territorial and close scale, through aerial mapping of the territorial context and translation of the physical and material qualities of the natural ground into an abstract sublimation of its essential, somehow embryonic character.

RESEARCH SIGNIFICANCE
Some twenty architects were represented, including Gregory Burgess, Barrie Marshall, Howard Raggatt, Frederick Romberg, Peter Elliott, and Leon van Schaik. The exhibition, which was sponsored by the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research, also showed works by artists from the UK, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Sweden and China. A second Drawing Out conference will be held in London in 2012.