After successful completion of the course, students are able to...

… apply the acquired skills to analyses of socio-spatial contexts. The focus is on a close combination of research and simultaneous translation into cartographic/graphical forms of representation. These, in turn, serve the decision-making process in architectural design as well as external communication.

As an exercise in drawing as well as in the recording and presentation of processes, selected construction sites in Vienna will be visited in the course of day trips. On site and in post-processing in an analogous 'drawing room', constructions are 'de-constructed' and construction processes are 're-constructed'. As in a comic/storyboard, the production and assembly of selected components are presented in sequences.

The social aspect is of particular importance: Who is involved in the construction and at what stage? How are the roles distributed and what hierarchies are there? Where do the planners* and workers* come from, which paths do they take and where are they accommodated? Which routes does the construction material take and which 'nodes' are relevant for material handling, temporary storage, etc.?

On the basis of an intensive examination of drawings, spatial and semiotic elements, specific spatial situations and processes are tracked down, depicted and translated into mappings and comics for selected construction sites in Vienna-Central. At the end of the process there are large-format and hand-drawn assemblages, which, brought together in a "Drawing Room", make the construction site appear as an ambiguous internationally networked place.

The participants will be introduced to different forms of mappings and drawings as conceptual analysis tools and media for the representation of spatial situations. To this end, we deal with the selected construction sites in drawings on several levels and across different scales, using the technique of zooming: We start with actor- and material-related mappings that depict selected buildings and nodes in relation to individual travel and transport routes. In a further step, we dive deeper into the architectural form, dealing with the spatial and structural characteristics, especially with the help of sectional drawings. In a further zoom we analyze the meaning of the places as social junctions.

Presence, commitment and cooperation, quality and expressiveness of the cartographic and graphic representations made in the seminar.