Today we see conflicted attitudes toward our relationship with urban "nature." What happens, for instance, when urban wildlife encroaches on more densely populated areas of cities? What happens when they develop habitats outside officially zoned territories, and in residential or commercial neighborhoods? Ants of the Prairie sees these challenges and "conflicts" not as limitations, but as instigators for creative practice. In our work, we are developing a series of projects that incorporate wildlife habitats into constructed environments. Recently completed works include Bat Tower, Bat Cloud, and a second iteration of Bat Cloud installed in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
Joyce Hwang, AIA, NCARB, is an Associate Professor of Architecture at the University at Buffalo, SUNY, and the Director of Ants of the Prairie. She is a recipient of a 2014 Emerging Voices Award from the Architectural League of New York, a 2013 New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) Fellowship, and a residency at the MacDowell Colony, where she was selected as a National Endowment for the Arts Fellow. Hwang received a Master of Architecture degree from Princeton University and a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Cornell University, where she received the Charles Goodwin Sands Memorial Bronze Medal.
This lecture was made possible by the William Bronson and Grayce Slovet Mitchell Lectureship.
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