PennDesign adds to the FREESPACE at the Venice Biennale
Faculty, teaching assistant, and student installations are on view at the 16th International Architecture Exhibition, organized around the theme FREESPACE
Members of PennDesign faculty, along with teaching assistants and students, will have installations showcased at the esteemed Venice Architecture Biennale through Nov. 25.
Following the theme of FREESPACE, the Graham Chair Professor of Architecture Marian Weiss, who is also the cofounder of the firm Weiss/Manfredi, installed a hybrid site called “Lines of Movement” in the main exhibition space. Taking the shape of a curving, open form, “Lines of Movement” exhibits models of Weiss/Manfredi projects, including the Krishna P. Singh Center for Nanotechnology. Projected throughout the installation is a continuous looping set of four simultaneous films that highlight the hybrid sites the firm has created, linking cityscapes and gardens, art and ecology, and public infrastructure and private spaces.
Ferda Kolatan, an associate professor of practice at PennDesign, curated “12 Objects & 12 Images,” an installation that will be on view at the Palazzo Mora’s exhibition “Time Space Existence,” featuring works from faculty members, teaching assistants, and students.
“12 Objects & 12 Images” explores the relationship between an object that presents itself visually in the foreground of an environment and images that recede to the background. When considering the divide and the junction where these foregrounds and backgrounds intersect, the concepts of content, meaning, value, and power in architecture are examined.
Kolatan’s firm, SU11, is also teaming up with six former PennDesign students from the class of 2017 on a collaborative exhibition, “Hybrid Urbanity,” for a Biennale Session titled Iskandar Puteri 100YC. Miller Professor and Chair of Architecture Winka Dubbeldam’s firm Archi-Tectonics will also be represented in the exhibition.
Novel plant-based approach to a better, cheaper GLP-1 delivery system
Research led by Penn Dental’s Henry Daniell investigates the use of a lettuce-based, plant-encapsulated delivery platform as a new oral delivery of two GLP-1 drugs previously approved by the FDA in injectable form.
No brain, no gain: Neuronal activity enhances benefits of exercise
Research led by Penn neuroscientist J. Nicholas Betley and collaborators finds that hypothalamic neurons are essential for translating physical exertion into endurance, potentially opening the door to exercise-mimicking therapies.
In honor of Valentine's Day, and as a way of fostering community in her Shakespeare in Love course, Becky Friedman took her students to the University Club for lunch one class period. They talked about the movie "Shakespeare in Love," as part of a broader conversation on how Shakespeare's works are adapted.
In Becky Friedman’s English course Shakespeare in Love, undergraduate students analyze language, genre, and adaptation in the Bard’s plays through the lens of love.
Beating the heat: Designing cooling for bodies in motion
Dorit Aviv, director of Weitzman’s Thermal Architecture Lab, studies how humans, technology, and design intersect, paving the way for the development of novel approaches to cooling people efficiently.
