Data Materialization Studio Lab, collective project: Angela Atkinson, Michelle Gay, Barbara Rauch, Casper Sutton-Fosman

Model Gallery model is a collaboration between Angela, Casper, Michelle and Barbara. The Data Materialization Studio Lab houses a scale model ‘gallery’ (1 inch to 1 foot, mobile) built by artist Wyn Gelenyse. We use this specific gallery model to examine the potentials of ‘models’ - as a conceptual ‘machine’ to explore theoretical, material, poetic and political aspects. The critical discourse around the model object, or scaled object, invites different perspectives that address scaling, un-scaling, a disruption of grand vision, the importance of the ‘locale’, and presents both specific and metaphorical space to test new and challenge existing paradigms. And while we are working with the physical model in the institutional site, we can easily transport this project into a point cloud to further complicate the concept – and this is what we did here with Model Gallery model, where ‘model’ then enters the current dialogue about the virtual augmented and the digital as material speculation. “Modelling” is our working method, we see the model as simultaneously object and action. The physical as well as the digital model is mutable - the interior and exterior walls can shift, floor plans can be altered, lighting and sound systems are changeable, projection is accommodated. On wheels, it also functions like a vehicle and can be introduced to different spaces for provoking the future.