Material Acts

Material Acts: Experimentation in Architecture and Design—comprising both a publication and an exhibition of the same name—begins with a reframing of materials as processes. Materials are typically described as raw resources, fixed products, or inert objects to be sourced from a shelf in the store—a function of commodity more than of making. Yet, such understandings of materials belie the complex logistical, economic, ecological, and technological actions that transform matter into the material substrate for our lives. Instead, Material Acts considers materials as participants in and outputs of cultural practices and techniques. This perspective of materials as an ongoing process—rather than as raw resources or finished products—centers human actors and systems in the event of the material transformation, reminding us that materials are not inert objects, but active.



Material Acts is organized by Kate Yeh Chiu and Jia Yi Gu, with Strat Coffman and Hilary Huckins-Weidner.