Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Scattered Fragments: Art, Architecture, And Archives In Revolutionary Urban Cairo, Mounira M. Makar

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis analyzes how revolutions impact urban Cairo and its communities, specifically within artistic, architectural and archival practice while acknowledging the central role of public spaces in giving way to such revolutionary practices. Fundamentally, this paper highlights the foundational nature of such practices in developing urban communities.

Learning Curve: Designing An Inclusive Early Childhood Learning Center, Sarah Alrumayh

Theses and Dissertations

This research centers on the improvement of early childhood education environments in hopes to reduce the disparities in outcomes among children aged 2-6, widely known as "the achievement gap." It sheds light on designing an inclusive, child-centered school for students with specific learning disabilities (SLD) and speech or language impairments (SLI). Drawing on the IDEA (Individuals with Disabilities Education Act), it underscores the benefits of integrating students with special education needs into mainstream education, thereby fostering inclusive learning environments. (IDEA, 1975).

The research question probes how to create a nurturing and adaptable school environment tailored to the diverse needs of …

Biophilia: Developing A Taste For Care, Che'leah Shannon

Theses and Dissertations

People in materially developed cultures spend over 90% of their lives in buildings (Evans & McCoy, 1998). Commencing with the industrial revolution these materially developed cultures see most of their populus moving from the countryside to the city in search of work and better lives. The city, an urban and modern development of densely packed peoples, buildings, and infrastructure, has developed as an efficient solution to meet the needs of a cosmopolis.

The city has developed widely without a necessity or place for nature. The ground outside is paved with concrete, efficient and comfortable for travel, buildings are built high …

(Not) Knowing, Jared Friedman

Theses and Dissertations

Jared Friedman’s work creates monuments out of banal common objects. Through acrylic paintings on- Astroturf, burlap, canvas, and upholstery fabric- he explores the ambiguity of the unremarkable, such as the condenser coils on the back of a refrigerator. In, (Not) Knowing, he parses the difference between knowing and understanding.

The Liminality Of Identity And Place: Chinese Transracial Adoptees And The Built Environment, Roe Draus

Theses and Dissertations

International adoption of children from China began in 1992, and between 1999 and 2019, China adopted out approximately 267,000 children. At this time, around 82,000 Chinese children were adopted by American families and raised within a culturally and racially different environment. As a unique diaspora community that has been involuntarily and forcefully displaced, Chinese transracial adoptees (TRAs) are often fragmented across the United States. The outcomes have especially complex effects as their identities are often situated in perpetual in-betweenness as they must negotiate the meanings of their Chineseness, Chinese Americanness, and adopteeness. Since a sense of self and identity is …

Developing Mexico: History, Architecture, Photography, And Esther Born’S The New Architecture In Mexico, Tyler Considine

Theses and Dissertations

Esther Born’s The New Architecture in Mexico (1937) presents the first survey of Mexican modern architecture and documents early works by Luis Barragán, Juan O’Gorman, among other Mexican modernists. This thesis examines Born’s architectural photography alongside that of Lola Álvarez Bravo, Guillermo Kahlo, and other photographers and within discourses of modernity, history, and representation.

From Silence To Forte: Developing An Inclusive Space For Persian Musicians To Flourish, Sholeh Salimi

Theses and Dissertations

Music serves as a reflection of culture and conveys various emotional and intellectual states, such as a nation's perspective, social attitudes, and historical background. However, the Iranian revolution in 1979 led to the ban of music by the new regime, limiting the output and audience for Iranian music. In addition, the emergence of Western music accessibility through technology posed challenges for traditional Persian music, and the government's restrictions on music further compounded the problem. To support and advance the preservation and dissemination of Iranian music, this study aims to explore how an interior designer can create a space that enables …

Crafting Community: A Ceramics Center, Nadia Mechboukh

Theses and Dissertations

For artisans, being part of a community can facilitate engaging with the public. Networking and collaborating with peers are vital for building meaningful relationships that can lead to mutual inspiration and learning opportunities. By strengthening the connection between society and various forms of craft, we can weave invisible threads that link the stories that craft tells with the time and place in which they were created. Pottery is a craft that has existed for thousands of years. Ceramics and clay have carried the history of communities and their ways of living through centuries and have been used as identifiers of …

Building For A New National Body: The Architecture Of Manuel Amábilis And Neomaya Modernity, Emily A. Cocco

Theses and Dissertations

In the history of architecture following the Mexican revolution, Yucatecan architect Manuel Amábilis (1889-1966) has often been passed over in favor of discussions of architects working in the nation’s cultural and political center, Mexico City, many of whom engaged in neocolonial and functionalist modern style to envision a modern Mexico transformed by the revolution. This omission is short-sighted, since Amábilis’s Maya revivalist architecture provides an iteration of postrevolutionary Mexican architecture that visually and ideologically manifests the socialist and proindingenous aims of the revolution while imagining a paradigm of modern nationalism that was not rooted in Western ideals. Amábilis’ neomaya architecture, …

Micro-Metropolis: Space, Work, And Waste In The Maquettes Of Constant And Bodys Isek Kingelez, Shoshanah B. Rosen

Theses and Dissertations

Constant Nieuwenhuys and Bodys Isek Kingelez both create futuristic utopias in the form of architectural maquettes. This comparative study explores each artist’s reverence for technology, global connectivity, and new forms of economic production. It argues that these utopias represent desires endemic to late modernity and capitalism, including consumption, nomadism, automation.

Flourish: Exploring Healing Environments In A Residential Treatment Setting, Emily D. Kalafian

Theses and Dissertations

The following project explores the ways in which our environments promote healing and support recovery through the design of a residential center for eating disorder recovery. The center will serve 8-10 young women as they seek recovery from restrictive forms of eating disorders. The center will accommodate the necessary staff personnel as well as spaces for supporting activities and wraparound services. The project intends to create a place for healing that feels safe, warm, and considers patients’ needs for autonomy, dignity, and a sense of control amidst disorder. This is a place to create meaningful relationships and to participate in …

It Takes A Muscle: Wholes, Holes, And Other Voids, Saar Shemesh

Theses and Dissertations

IT TAKES A MUSCLE¹

In the BELLY of the BEAST, the HUMAN

in the deep end of a SWIMMING POOL

in a GRAVE, looking up/out from within

at the base of a CRATER, ABYSS, PIT

the room as a CRADLE, INCUBATOR

architecture as MOTHER MOULD.²

____________________________

¹ Title is borrowed and abbreviated: Spectral Display, “It Takes A Muscle To Fall In Love,” 1982.

² For what American-English delineates as ‘mold,’ British-English uses ‘mould’ and is more specific in its technicality. The former doesn’t distinguish in spelling between mold (fungus) and mold (mould). I’m not particularly a fan of …

Metamosque – Envisioning The Mosque As A Virtual Public Space, Alaa Albarazy

Theses and Dissertations

Historically, the mosque was not only a space for a communal prayer but also a place for building a community. Today, however, with conflicts and diseases fragmenting society, people are less able to gather physically in large spaces. Out of necessity, people rely on technology to get together and interact virtually. In this context, my research challenges the notion of the mosque as a physical space, proposing, instead, its extension into virtual space. Recent global events pose the question: Can the metaverse offer an opportunity for the mosque to reassert itself as a public space. I propose that a MetaMosque …

Again Black Again, Muthi Reed

Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

AGAIN BLACK AGAIN

by muthi reed, M.F.A

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Program Director: Stephen Vitiello

Committee: Semi Ryu, Orla McHardy, MK Abadoo, Cara Benedetto

AGAIN BLACK AGAIN. ABA-BBABB is documentation of a reparations practice and articulations for a reparations manifesto devised by the artist. Reparations begins with the self. Singing truth to the self. Talking with the self. The thesis organizes around the problems of surveillance and myth making about Black people and the subsequent source of self-regard, conjure and social dreaming …

Connections Exposed | A Library For The People, Stephanie Wilburn

Theses and Dissertations

MOTIVATION

The U.S. economy, democracy, and the health and happiness of citizens depends on maintaining social capital, the networks of bonds between community members. Social capital creates the trust that facilitates action and cooperation for mutual benefit. Since the 1960s, there has been a decline in-person socialization and social bonds both within and between demographic groups in the US resulting in reduced social capital (Putnam, 2000).

One measure to combat declining social capital is to create third places where incidental and repeated social interactions build and reinforce bonds between community members (Oldenburg, 1997).

With the reduction of accessible and inclusive …

Built For Food: The Resistance Of Chinese Immigrants From Service To Ownership, 1880-1960, Hongyan Yang

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores the resistant voices of Chinese immigrants embedded in their food and food spatial practices in California from 1880 to 1960. While restrictive immigration laws in the United States generally prohibited Chinese laborers from entering the country, a sizable number of Chinese laborers navigated a culinary path to America through cooking, farming, and operating Chinese restaurants; some gradually achieved upward mobility. Although these activities have been noted broadly in Chinese food and immigration histories, few scholars have explored their spatial and material impacts. There is, however, a rich transnational history behind the everyday spaces that Chinese immigrants occupied …

The Adobe Frontier, Christopher J. Gauthier

Theses and Dissertations

The Adobe Frontier is a documentary film about Ronald Rael and Virginia San Fratello—together known as “Studio Rael San Fratello” —and their work connecting contemporary technology with the legacy of pottery making and adobe architecture in the Southwest United States.

Some (Im)Material Girls, Living In (Im)Material Worlds, With Seeds, Stars, And Shit, Matthew Weiderspon

Theses and Dissertations

This writing situates material and gestural vocabularies cultivated in my artwork in relation to my lived experience; primarily my rural upbringing in Colorado. Scattered floor dispersals, calling sounds, and bodily movements desire reconsiderations of hope in precarity through a disorientation of place, association, scale, and language.

Hawsh Al-Basha: The Royal Cemetery In Cairo, Mai Mohamed Kolkailah

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis focuses on Hawsh al-Basha, the royal cemetery near the mausoleum of Imam al-Shafi‘i, which is arguably one of the most intriguing architectural moments in Ottoman Cairo. Firstly, the historiography of Hawsh al-Basha is examined carefully in order to situate the mausoleum temporally and geographically. Secondly, for a critical rewriting of the historical narrative, this study systematically cross-references contemporary sources with nineteenth-century travel accounts, among other material evidence, to effectively reconstruct the complicated building chronology of Hawsh al-Basha and reassess when the mausoleum was built. Then, the study surveys the various categories of ornamentation employed at the royal cemetery, …

The Algorithmic Mashrabiya: Reimagining The Traditional Islamic Screen, Ahmed Nour

Theses and Dissertations

Traditionally, a mashrabiya was an ornate wooden structure attached to the side of an Arabian building or house, with small, intricately patterned openings to provide both ventilation and privacy for the people inside. The patterns, following the geometric rules of Islamic ornament, lent a distinctive appearance to buildings in the region. A mashrabiya converted the house into a safe, private sanctuary, providing a magical scene inside, characterized by linear sun rays, filtered points of light and shadow. Over time, as building technology changed and the number of skilled craftsmen dwindled, the traditional mashrabiya has all but vanished. The aim of …

Haven: Support For Mothers, Sarah Kincaid

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores how a nonmedical interior environment can provide support and care for mothers during the perinatal period in order to prevent maternal mental health (MMH) issues such as anxiety and postpartum depression.

Flourish: Combating Food Insecurity & Promoting Wellness On A College Campus, Jocelyn Zavala

Theses and Dissertations

MOTIVATION In the past, it has been assumed that students enrolled in college are fairly privileged individuals unlikely to face challenges associated with poverty (Haskett et al., 2020). That assumption has been challenged in the past few decades and a survey released last year by the Hope Center for College, Community and Justice indicated that 45% of today’s higher education students face food insecurity (Goldrick-Rab et al., 2019). According to VCU’s Dean of Students Office, it is a situation in which a student lacks access to enough nutritious food in order to live a healthy, active life. Food insecurity can …

Humanizing Architecture: A Polymorphic Space, Nada Abbara

Theses and Dissertations

The built environments in which our communities thrive constitute an integral part of human experience and evolution. Yet, many places are detached from the way we experience them due to mass-production, which often produces standardized environments, and due to the tendency of modern architecture to delineate spaces as static objects rather than dynamic interactions. Thus, there is an emerging need to humanize architecture through an interdisciplinary approach that engages nature’s behavioral patterns. The project proposes a transformable polyhedral structure that interacts with human emotion through a three-dimensional morphing space that contracts and expands. This spatial interaction is achieved through a …

The Object Memory Palace, Amra Causevic

Theses and Dissertations

I am interested in orchestrating instances of potentiality or concrete possibilities that proposes the futurity of play through means of touch, activation, assembly, and interaction within art spaces. The installation mentioned is composed of found objects and repurposed materials that address themes of place, memory, object-ness, and the archive, through gestural means of poetics and map making. It is an invitation to create new logics and find moments of empathy, connectivity, and hopes for a collective.

Design Hub: Activating Community By Design, Ed Williams

Theses and Dissertations

MOTIVATION

At the turn of the century, Robert Putnam (2000, 27) wrote “...a powerful tide bore Americans into ever deeper engagement in the life of their communities, but a few decades ago that tide reversed and we were overtaken by a treacherous rip current.” Putnam is describing a loss of “social capital” throughout American society. Research suggests that many of our contemporary issues are the result of a decline in “social capital,” or “community.”

This pervasive lack of community is thought to be detrimental to “educational performance, safe neighborhoods, equitable tax collection, democratic responsiveness, everyday honesty, and even our health …

Reclaiming Beercraft- A Sensory Experience, Zishan Zeng

Theses and Dissertations

The senses are mainly a source of arousal, enjoyment and pain and are of vital importance for the human body. They are also important because sensory perception is typical of many cultural artifacts and is given unique intensities and extensions, shapes and meanings through them (Heywood, 2017). As Finnish architect Juhani Pallasmaa stated, “architecture is the art of reconciliation between ourselves and the world, and this mediation takes place through the senses” (Pallasmaa, 2012). To make architecture truly meaningful, it should be able to awaken all the senses.

The way we feel, smell, and even taste is hard to capture. …

Hidden Gem: Realizing The Value Of Community In Healthcare Environments, Nicole Lee

Theses and Dissertations

Holistic approaches in healthcare address a problem from its root causes. The American healthcare model – both its treatment and distribution methods – is among the many issues that divides the nation. We have found ourselves with millions of uninsured people among a growing population where chronic illness is on the rise among adults and children, especially within low-income demographics (Goodman & Conway, 2016). Though this is a widespread epidemic, only recently has there been any effort to question and reform traditional healthcare.

The way that wellness is assessed in America has been detrimental to patient outcomes …

Architecture As As Act Of Transfer: Framing Denise Scott Brown's Architectural Practice With Performance, Kelsey Kuehn

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the architectural practice of theorist, planner, architect, and activist Denise Scott Brown. Existing scholarship about the architect’s work is sparse and typically situates her as a significant figure due to her status as a woman working in a male-dominated field. To address this gap in scholarship, this thesis analyzes Scott Brown’s intellectual formation relative to her work on the Crosstown Community Advocacy Planning project carried out in Philadelphia in 1968 through the lens of performance theory. Her practice is considered a mediation between the archive and the repertoire as they are defined by performance studies scholar Diana …

Women, Architecture And Representation In Mamluk Cairo, Amina Karam

Theses and Dissertations

Of the hundreds of documented religious monuments of Mamluk Cairo, known for its intense and often competitive building activity, about twenty are known to be associated with women, at least ten of which still exist in some form. This thesis discusses women's participation in the Mamluk culture of patronage and construction, looking at monuments associated with women not only as a body of work but as the architecture of individual players within the larger building context of Mamluk Cairo. Relying on architectural evidence as well as topographical literature and historical sources, this thesis offers a chronological narrative of women's architecture, …

Defense In Desolation, Dounia Bendris

Theses and Dissertations

This paper discusses different forms of defense strategies in architecture throughout history as well as how a building’s function morphs over time in relation to the political and social climate that surrounds it. Both of these concepts provide a framework for understanding my thesis drawing, “Defense in Desolation,” which uses bunkers in abandonment as a reference to the psychological impact of architecture outside of functionality.