The Art & Topos Research Projects for Roma Housing Developments in Europe has been conducted by T.A.M.A. in collaboration with The University of Thessaly, Dept of Architecture in Volos, Greece.

The course aims to connect contemporary artistic practices with site-specific, natural or social, spatial frameworks. Today, both artistic and architectural practices hold inter-human relations and their interaction with their surrounding space as the core pursuit of their creative endeavors.

In this course students are asked to chart out and map a designated area of study based on sociological, anthropological, cultural or geographical research and data. This mapping process will become the core tool for this course as they are able to examine on a first hand basis issues related to social interactivity and sociability in relation to spatial layout and infrastructure.

The winter semester course aims at mapping selected towns and villages in the plain of Thessaly. Case studies are devised to create a new data guide for each region and to identify the needs of their residents due to state apathy. Each guide must contain an appendix – a proposal on improving the social infrastructure of the selected area.

Students are divided into groups of three and each group carries out research survey-mapping of their desingated area. Research required to be carried out with on-site visits where all necessary information and data is collected and recorded.

Maria Papadimitriou
Excerpt from Art & Topos course description, www.arch.uth.gr

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