Simon Twose, architect and Associate Professor at the School of Architecture, Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington, presents the first in our new series of lunchtime talks. These have been devised to elaborate on the histories and uses of the materials and practices Kate Newby draws upon in her full gallery exhibition YES TOMORROW.

This talk introduces two projects that use concrete as an architectural drawing medium. The first, Concrete Drawing, was a full-scale detail of a wall drawn in two tonnes of concrete, exhibited at Adam Art Gallery Te Pātaka Toi, in 2015. The second, Reef, was an architectural sketch of the Kaikōura seabed, drawn in five hundred cast concrete objects, six soundscapes, virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). Reef was shown at Tin Sheds Gallery at the University of Sydney in 2020. Both projects use concrete to play with the limits of architectural drawing, stretching and pulling it to find new and strange ways in which space can be represented and experienced.

As an academic and a practising architect, Simon Twose focuses on drawing as a conceptual and material means to explore the territories between art and architecture. He has exhibited widely, including invited contributions to five Venice Architecture Biennales and PQ15, the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space.