This was a studio full of excitement. Every student has their separated topics that never overlap with others', but match the topic of the Possibility of Island. My idea was constructed on two ways:

1. Base on the study of Buckminster Fuller's Dymaxion Map, I put forward the issue of upside-down the "figure/ground" relationship between land and sea, and established the argument of "sea=island" after I drawing a new map with oceans in the center. The new ocean-center map became the base of the following mapping study;

2. I discussed the inevitable prejudice occurred in the mapping process, which was result of distortion of projections and the political inclinations, and suggested that we should use ear instead of eye to perceive the world. Then I draw a sound map in compare to visual map, and decided my second theme which is sound.

 

My study included the introduction of Sonar Technology into the action of protecting marine animals from the threat of be trapped during the ocean garbage collection; the re-evaluation of Sound Mirrors as new landscape, which were utilized before the invention of Radar by military during World War I for detecting enemies; and the renovation of an abandoned military tower on the Thames Estuary that had been occupied by illegal broadcaster as radio center, and transformed this infrastructure into a sound tracks lab with multi-scalar sounds broadcasting in different floors.

 

Maunsell Forts is a series of military towers. It reminded me of the Outlook Tower, which is a six floors tower in Edinburgh designed by Patrick Geddes. Geddes put a world map on the first floor and a Europe map on the second…… on the top floor there is no map but an outlook platform for visitors to enjoy the view of the city. Such as how I inverted the idea of visual map with sound map, I tried to bring the experience of the Outlook Tower in the Maunsell Fort, and made it into a five floors sound tracks lab with three floors on top of water and two below: from the top to the bottom floor, visitors can experience the sound of multiple scales, from Thames Estuary to the English Strait, to the Ocean Gyres, and to the world.

 

By doing this I tried to metaphorically replicate a journey of "becoming blind": as you walk down stair what you can perceive with your eyes becomes less, but instead you can hear "further". The juxtaposition of the Outlook Tower and the Maunsell Forts generated a series of dramatic comparisons: between the action modes of "climbs up" toward the sky and "dives down" into the ocean bottom, and between the emotion of fulfilling the desire for control by expanding eyesight and the curiosity reinforced by expanding hearing.