The Architecture Unit of ATINER is organising a Stream on “Architectures of Silence and the Creation of Atmospheres”, 8-11 July, 2019 as part of  the 9th Annual International Conference on Architecture sponsored by the Athens Journal of Architecture.

It is already more than a century ago, when Søren Kierkegaard exclaimed in front of a ‘diseased world’: “Create silence! Bring people to silence!”. Almost one century later, Louis I. Kahn would state that in front of the presence of the eternal works of art (he was talking about the pyramids) “prevails the feeling ‘Silence’, from which is felt Man’s desire to express. This before the first stone was laid.” Already in our days, Peter Zumthor has written that the atmosphere is created “either by tensioning the air with matter and light or by tensioning the air with sounds and silences.”

This triple reflection (ethical, artistic and architectural) encourages researchers and practitioners to tackle urban and architectural current issues. Whether there were acoustic pollution, lack of intimacy or brisk professional practice, silence seems to be in the center of architectural production, either as a disregarded aspect or as a desired unreachable object.

We accept presentations from the fields of humanistic, artistic and architectural field, that reflect on silence. Case studies, theoretical essays and critical essays in the area of artistic and architectural production are very welcome. This stream wants to give some light to the question: how can silence frame our architectural activity?

You may participate as presenter of one paper, chair or/and organizer of a session, or observer.

Please submit a 300-word abstract before 11 March 2019, by email, to [email protected], to Dr. José Ángel Hidalgo Arellano, Academic Member, ATINER & Associate Professor, Xi’An Jiaotong – Liverpool University, Suzhou, China or Dr. Joan Ramon Cornellana Díaz, Associate Professor, Polytechnic University of Catalonia, Spain. Please include: Title of Paper, Full Name (s), Current Position, Institutional Affiliation, an email address and at least 3 keywords that best describe the subject of your submission. Decisions will be reached within four weeks of your submission. Please use the abstract submitting form.