Across RCA (2019)

Re-Imagining Psychogeography

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This is a walking-based project led by 2019-20 co-presidents Adalberto Lonardi (MA Interior Design) and Katharina Siegel (MA Sculpture), following on from the Walkative Across RCA projects led by Simon King and Jaspar Joseph-Lester between 2013-15 which evolved into the student-led Walkative Society.

Psychogeographic research has its roots in the arts or at the point of a junction where art, architecture, geography, psychology, and philosophy intersect. The term was initially influenced by The Situationist International, a left-wing, avant-garde group of European artists and intellectuals founded in 1957. If psychogeography investigates what influence the architectural or geographical environment has on perception, mental experience and behavior, we can ask what are the characteristics of structures by which we are surrounded on a daily basis – the visible and invisible infrastructures of cities like London.

The workshop will have as its outcome the publication and exhibition of 3 to 4 group projects. Input will be in the form of guest presentations that, inter alia, provide a history of psychogeography and art movements that explored ways of unleashing the subconscious imagination. From this, we pose a question: how do different places make us feel and behave? Groups will take this question as a starting point for their own research walking. Participants will be mapping an area of London taking into consideration modern or future social patterns. In collaboration with RCA graphic designer, José Garcia and Betty Brunfaut we will communicate the works in a self-published fanzine.