At 3:00 pm on the afternoon of April 1, 2016, “Spatial Cognition and Performance: Initial Design 2 Teaching Exhibition” was commenced at the spiral staircase exhibition hall of the Building 5 in CAFA. The exhibition was organized by the School of Architecture, CAFA, and undertaken by the Teacher Development Center at CAFA. Established in 2013, the Teacher Development Center aims to adhere to the spirit of the academy, centered on teachers, to serve teachers and teaching, and it is the first time for the Teacher Development Center to undertake a teaching exhibition.

“Initial Design 2” is the basic course for the first semester of freshmen from the School of Architecture, and it is themed “Spatial Cognition and Performance”. Starting from the observation and thinking on the level of thinking, then unfolding the spatial cognition and experience of the resident urban environment; it then emphasizes the grasping of drawing principles and techniques on a basic level; with the level of performance, it gives play to the excellent expressive ability of the students from the academy, through a series of exercises of different mediacovering photography, drafts, sketching, analysis of diagrams, modelling, three views of a building and the rendering, etc., to help the freshmen gradually grasp the relationship between the expression of a blueprint and architectural space. The exhibition is around the teaching practice of the basic courses of the School of Architecture, CAFA over the last 10 years has researched the teaching ideas and thoughts while at the same time it presents the teaching achievements and explores the basic teaching mode of architectural design with the characteristics of the academy.

The opening ceremony was presided over by the Deputy Dean of the CAFA School of Architecture Fu Yi, Party Secretary of CAFA Gao Hong, Assistant to the CAFA President, Dean of the Academic Affairs Office and Secretary-General of the committee of Teacher Development Center Wang Xiaolin, Deputy Dean of the Academic Affairs Office and Associate Secretary-General of the committee of Teacher Development Center Qiang Yong, founding member of the School of Architecture, CAFA Han Guangxu, Deputy Dean of the CAFA School of Architecture Cheng Qiming, Director of the Department of Foundation at the School of Architecture Wang Xiaohong, as well as other teachers and the teachers from other universities attended the opening ceremony. Party Secretary Gao Hong, Wang Xiaolin, Han Guangxu, Cheng Qiming, and the curator of the exhibition Wang Xiaohong respectively addressed the opening ceremony.

“Spatial Cognition and Performance: Initial Design 2 Teaching Exhibition” is presented in chronological order of the course, going from the easy to the difficulty and more complicated, from observation, mapping, analysis, understanding, experience, reconstruction, to the final performance. It goes through the training of seven subjects in ten weeks, to bring the students into the door of the building. Observation and photography helps the students abstract the basic elements such as lines, by observing; the analysis of the masters’ works is through copying the classic spaces to encourage the students to learn how to convert the three-dimension to the two-dimension; through analyzing the copied drawings to preliminary understand the influence of spatial form, spatial sequence, and function towards people’s behaviors, as well as the feelings of proportion, scale, and material; starting from a simple space, personally experiencing the relationship between space and people; survey and mapping of a building, and has a more precise and rational understanding of the space; placing the building in an environment, to understand the impact of the external environment towards the interior space of the building; Finally digesting all the knowledge, in order to finish the first design work. The exhibition continues to May 3.

Text and photo by Ren Lijie, translated? by Chen Peihua and edited by Sue/CAFA ART INFO

Teachers’ team:

Wang Xiaohong, Hou Xiaolei, Wu Xiaomin, Wu Ruohu, Zhong Yu, Fan Ershuo, Cao Liang, Dang Xiaoyu, Liu Wenbao, Liu Siyong, He Keren