Reed Kram works as an Engineer and Designer, a Researcher and Practician. He is involved in research in design, as well as in Technology and Software development. He is one of the founding members of the legendary Aesthetics and Computation Group of the MIT Media Lab established around John Maeda, and has carried out a number of research and design projects together with Maeda. His research deals in particular with the phenomenon of interactivity, and with the relationship between new media and architecture - he is, for example, involved in designing reactive spaces. "There is now a new generation developing in architecture, and interactivity as a discipline and movement is being extended and broadened. The perception and increasing flexibility of design methods is now a reality, where in the recent past this was a debate on form and aesthetics.” ‚Reed Kram wants to go beyond his colleagues` interest in replacing physical space with virtual space by directly exploring the potential of graphic media to become spatial. Such a project ultimately challenges our conception of architecture.` Leo Gullbring

He is currently researching at the Chalmers Media Lab in Göteborg, and is teaching at the Designskolen Koldeing, with interactive media such as electronic games, interactive television or didactic CD-Foms, but also with motion graphics, web and print design. For urban drift he presented a talk on the effectivity of time-based, interactive media in the urban and architectural context - the title of his presentation "multimedia against architecture” showed what fundamental changes in the design process, and which perceptual shifts are possible with the employment of such new media technologies. "During the last 3-4 years a dramatic impression has been made upon architecture of the realities of media affecting space”. Through his collaboration with the Office of Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in Rotterdam, Kram has developed interactive media applications and reactive spaces for architectural projects such as the Seattle Public Library, und the new Signature stores for Prada in NY, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Multimedia Against Architecture
reed kram
Old vs. young.
Permanence vs. dynamism.
Physical vs. metaphysical.
Stability vs. freedom.

The meeting of architecture and multimedia creates battle lines on many fronts. Yet multimedia thinking and multimedia making have the very real potential to affect urban spaces beyond mere autocad functions. Te future city is both the physical city and the imagined city, the city of the mind's eye unhindered by mass or location: social networks, storytelling, brands, perception. This is as it always has been. Multimedia now lets us make visible elements of the imagined city in the physical city. Using new media we can build, transform, and destroy the imaginary city within the physical city. For urban drift I will present proposals for built public spaces that explore this border between the physical and the imaginary made in collaboration with the Dutch Architecture firm OMA.

urban drift 2001 / Panel 02

www.kramdesign.com