Big Australia Party

Big Australia Party was a Bachelors of Architecture Studio at RMIT University School of Architecture + Urban Design. Semester 2, 2021. It was the first studio in the Architecture As Propaganda series.

The studio explored the relationships between architecture and political media from these angles:

architecture (form and graphic) as representation of a policy idea
architecture as a place where media production occurs
architecture as a form of ‘longue durée’ political media itself

Students were asked to investigate these ideas in a direct and propositional way, via weekly design exercises involving the gradual demolition of the RMIT design hub, and in its place the construction of the media headquarters for a new political party: ‘Big Australia Party’.

Each student’s BAP had a dominant policy platform, agenda or attitude which influenced the program, material choices and urban presence of the headquarters, brought to life by specific events (‘Party’ being a double entendre and ‘Big Australia’ a term introduced by former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in 2009).

Policies generally centred around environmental protection, migration and refugee rights, corporate tax and inequality, urbanisation and density. The studio’s underlying research question was: in what ways can architecture, as building and as practice, communicate directly to the public? How can it lobby for a cause through form and material and ubiquity? How can it demonstrate an enduring commitment to a political idea?

The studio looked at city, national and continental scale projects by AMO and MVRDV in particular as precedents.

https://linktr.ee/BigAustraliaParty

Student work shown by: