Coded Objects
Lise Meitner Group Anna-Maria Meister
At a moment when the design and distribution of information has become a dominant driver of world politics and economy, the formal and material implications of “codes” often remain unnoticed or unchecked—as do concurrent shifts of agency and attempts to program society through spatial and formal measures. Hence, the research group will look at the space of coding not as abstract technology or remote activity, but at the programming of objects through design. It is imperative to investigate the form that drives the production of seemingly non-aesthetic processes—and the analysis of forms emerging in the focal point of material and data. With form as epistemic entry point, the multi-disciplinary research group will probe information systems and data as (and through) objects of design, while investigating the role of material forms in automated processes. In short, this project will focus on proto-algorithmic thinking as material and spatial practice.
Taking coded objects as central lens of refraction will question any ready dichotomy of design and bureaucracy—and any assumptions of "neutral" technology. The investigation of the form of processes and the objects they produce—locating design moves in systems imagined as automated—promises to unveil uncomfortable friction and productive affinities necessary for this research to bear on the present. The matter of processes matters, so to speak. Shaping things is often masked by rhetoric of technological "neutrality," but given the global circulation of images and objects, and the embedded design of information, form-giving operations and the matter of design demand closer scrutiny. This project will carve out discourses of responsibilities, aspirations and techniques of forming values through aesthetic means. After all, what is coded here are not only objects or tasks—but subjects.
By looking at the coded objects that surround us as a set of human, material and aesthetic negotiations, the group wants to move the focus toward the importance of formal intentions (and consequences) in prescribed processes and programs. At the same time, it will consider the making of objects and giving form as locally and culturally highly specific practice, be it the deliberate shaping by experts or intelligent solutions for material processes developed by communities. Building on the critical work around "precision," "objectivity" or "technological efficiency", especially its questioning through feminist and queer methods, the group will study practices developed by shape-givers together with bureaucrats to create form (both historically and contemporaneously). Techniques of making will serve not just as tacit knowledge, but as skillset and tool in the operations of (always already) coded objects.
The group includes doctoral and postdoctoral positions, collaborative and individual research projects, as well as scientific guests, aiming for a wide range of scientific and public outcomes and building upon three modes of research: rigorous, in-depth archival work to uncover and evaluate case studies; intensive interdisciplinary exchange toward shared terminology and methodologies; and, lastly, a strong focus on making as form of knowledge, namely on the tangible, material and formal skills and sensorial experience of formgivers and their practices.
See also the recent article by Anna-Maria Meister:
Coded Objects: The Forms of Proto-Algorithmic Thinking.
Lise Meitner Research Group Anna-Maria Meister
Books
Medina Warmburg, Joaquín, Anna-Maria Meister, Martin Kunz, and Mechthild Ebert. Frei Otto. Building with Nature. München London New York: Prestel Verlag (2025).
Anna-Maria Meister, Teresa Fankhänel, Lisa Beißwanger, Chris Dähne, Christiane Fülscher and Anna Luise Schubert (eds). Are You a Model? On an Architectural Medium of Spatial Exploration. Berlin: Jovis Verlag (2024).
https://jovis.de/en/book/9783986120726
Hansun Hsiung, Laetitia Lenel and Anna-Maria Meister. Entangled Temporalities. Special Issue of the "Journal of the History of Knowledge" (2023).
https://journalhistoryknowledge.org/issue/view/839
Book Chapters
Karina Pawlow. "TikTok’s Duet Feature: Prodused Images in Political Contexts and Beyond". In Cinematic Images. The Digital Condition of Moving Images. Lars Grabbe, Patrick Rupert-Kruse, Norbert Schmitz (Hg.). Büchner: Marburg (2024). 119-145.
https://www.ssoar.info/ssoar/handle/document/98526
Rebecca Carrai. "The IKEA Suburb. A Catalogued Imagery of Single-Family Housing". In What's Next for Mom and Dad's House? Edited by Federico Zanfi and Martino Tattara. Spector Books. (2024). 69-87.
Anna-Maria Meister and Mechthild Ebert. "The Powers of Metadata: Stories of Fragile Knowledge Constructions". In Architecture Archives of the Future. Proceedings of the Tenth Annual Conference of the Jaap Bakema Study Center (November 2023). 201–208.
Anna-Maria Meister. "Processing Models, Modelling Processes for the HfG Ulm ca. 1952". In Designing the Computational Image, Imagining Computational Design. Edited by Daniel Cardoso Llach and Theodora Vardouli. Oro Editions (2023). 80–83.
Articles
Meister, Anna-Maria. “Coded Objects: A Material Method”. In Technology|Architecture + Design, 8 (2) (2024). 183–86. DOI:10.1080/24751448.2024.2405343.
Virgina Marano, Charlotte Matter and Laura Valterio. "Bodily Matter and Complex Embodiment in the Art of Donald Rodney". In RACAR: Journal of the Universities Art Association of Canada (2024). vol. 49, no.2
Rebecca Carrai. "Degrowth to Architecture". In Stoà. Open Seminar (June 2024). 16-24.
https://files.cargocollective.com/c979116/24_sto--open-seminar.pdf
Anna-Maria Meister. "Coded Objects: The Forms of Proto-Algorithmic Thinking". In Historical Studies in the Natural Sciences (November 2023). 53 (5): 518–528.
https://online.ucpress.edu/hsns/article/53/5/518/198194/Coded-ObjectsThe-Forms-of-Proto-Algorithmic
Hansun Hsiung, Laetitia Lenel and Anna‐Maria Meister. "Introduction". In Journal for the History of Knowledge, 4 (2023). 9–32. DOI: 10.55283/jhk.17017
https://journalhistoryknowledge.org/article/view/17017
Anna-Maria Meister. "Chernobyl’s Palimpsestic Shelters". In Journal for the History of Knowledge, 4 (2023). 165–192. DOI: 10.55283/jhk.12570
https://journalhistoryknowledge.org/article/view/12570
Reviews
Virgina Marano. "Relocating Modernism: Global Metropolises". Modern Art and Exile (METROMOD). A digital exile archive and urban mapping project. In Exilforschung. Ein internationales Jahrbuch, Band 42/2024: Exil und Emotionen. Edited by Esther Kilchmann and Sebastian Schirrmeister. Berlin, Boston: DeGruyter (2025). 325-327.
https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783111329345/html
2025
"Architecture Theory goes Architekturschaufenster!" 31.1.2025
The chair for architecture theory (led by Anna-Maria Meister) makes architectural theory more tangible by exhibiting it, discussing and presenting it in Karlsruhe's urban space! In this evening we want to discuss insights, questions and ideas from our courses with students and guests. We move through diverse scales, categories and contexts: we will work on key terms of architectural theory, read critical theory, examine the different scales of architectural objects, examine the culture of bathing facilities, analyse architectures of political decision-making and visit the Federal Court of Justice, and, while "annotating" another study trip live in Italy, we will look into Florentine archives. In doing so, we understand architectural theory as a unifying critical practice – and look forward to a lively exchange!
"Coffee+Jam", 25.2.2025, Karlsruher Institute of Technology (KIT)
The Lise Meitner Group "Coded Objects" in cooperation with the Professorship of Architectural Theory led by Anna-Maria Meister at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) is organizing a research brunch at KIT. No colloquium, no lecture, no formalities: at our research brunch, we discuss work in progress in a relaxed setting. Across status groups and degrees of elaboration, researchers exchange ideas and projects in a constructive and cooperative atmosphere. Food and drink are provided, after all we want to nourish body and soul.
http://at.ekut.kit.edu/1290.php
2024
"Politics of development: Imaging the human embryo series" 12.12.2024, University of Zurich, Switzerland
This seminar is co-organized by Virgina Marano, Laura Valterio, Agnes Kandlbinder and Sabine Settler. With a guest lecture by Nick Hopwood. Hosted by the University Research Priority Program "Human Reproduction Reloaded" H2R, University of Zurich, Switzerland. The seminar examines development series of human embryos and fetuses, which strructure reproduction knowledge through pregnancy apps, IVF standards and public health. It traces their creation and challenges in productive failures as successes. The seminar critiques their role in constructing identities by species, race and sex and questions the assumptions of today's dominant representations.
https://www.humanreproduction.uzh.ch/en.html%C2%A0
Launch of the Research Center saai / iaas, 27.11.2024, Kit, Karlsruhe
With the newly launched research center iaas [international architectural archival studies], research is located in the archive itself. With projects on metadata genesis or ordering structures in the estates, the iaas makes use of its unique position in the saai archive utilizing the synergies of the interdisciplinary team and the links between analog and digital processes, from two-dimensional files to three-dimensional models, the time lapses of long-term storage to the speed of AI-controlled data acquisition, and from material restoration processes to digital erosion. With two research start up positions and a postdoc position funded by the strategy fund of the KIT president, the iaas will work toward current and historical urgent question into and out of the archive itself. The location of the saai at the KIT, a University of Excellence and Helmholtz research center, allows the research topics to be ideally linked with developments in the philosophy of science, computer science, engineering and, last but not least, architecture.
https://www.saai.kit.edu/1695.php
Launch of an international residency program, 27.11.2024, Kit, Karlsruhe
Starting in 2025, the Wüstenrot Foundation will fund 3 fellows who will have the opportunity to research and work in residency at the saai for 4-6 weeks in early summer. The iaas Wüstenrot Residencies are aimed at researchers at all career levels. Detailed information on the application process will follow soon.
https://www.saai.kit.edu/1782.php
"Archival Artificial Intelligence", Project at the chair for Architecture Theory and saai archive, 2024 - 2027, KIT, Karlsruhe
Anna-Maria Meister was able to get the strategy fund og the president of the KIT funds for her project "Archival Artificial Intelligence" which is a cooperation of the chair for architecture theory and the saai archive at the KIT Karlsruhe. The fund consists of 215.000€ to develope a humanitites and comouter science approach to metadata techniques.
"Sensorial Encounters: Haptic and Non-Visual Access in Art", 25. - 26. November, Bibliotheca Hertziana, Rome, Italy
This seminar is co-organized by Virgina Marano, Tobias Teutenberg (Bibliotheca Hertziana), Charlotte Matter and Laura Valterio ("Rethinking Art History through Disability", Institute of Art History, University of Zurich). "Haptic and Non-Visual Access in Art" is an exploratory workshop that challenges the primacy of visual perception and terminology in art and art history. Inspired by the methodological insights of authors such as Georgina Kleege, Elizabeth Bearden and Amanda Cachia, among others, this workshop questions the traditional conflation of sight with knowledge. https://www.biblhertz.it/events/39662/2476328#:~:text=Sensorial%20Encounters%3A%20Haptic%20and%20Non%2DVisual%20Access%20in%20Art%20is,in%20art%20and%20art%20history.
"The Body in Plural: The Artifactuality of Human Reproduction", 29. Oktober, Institute of Art History, University of Zurich
This seminar is co-organized by Virgina Marano, Laura Valterio, Agnes Kandlbinder and Sabine Stettler. Together with a guest lecture by Brian McGowan the seminar is having a look at the concepts of normality and abnomality. It is questioning where these constructions come from and what it means to be normal or abnormal - and to what extent the history of the emergence of these ideas is centrally linked to their meaning. In this contect, one will examine the close symbiosis between the goals of eugenics and the rise of the discipline of statistics. https://www.humanreproduction.uzh.ch/en/News-and-Events/News/workshop_-BodyinPlural.html
"Borderless Design", 04. - 08. September, Design History Society Conference (DHC) in Canterbury, UK
Rebecca Carrai and Fredie Floré lead the Borderless Design conference panel, examining how design and transcends borders thorugh consumerism's growing influence. They discuss how companies like IKEA, Knoll and Vitra have spread specific design forms and philosophies globally, a trend rooted in the postwar era's increasing accessibility of goods. The panel explores the ubiquity of design as both material and symbolic, addressing global production, mediation, dissemination and related ecologial concerns. It questions the impact of global infrastructures, cross-nation production and the reasons behind some companies' global success, highlighting the actors and processors driving this phenomenon.
"Coffe+Jam", 04. September, Kunsthistorisches Institut, Florenz,
The Lise Meitner Group "Coded Objects" in cooperation with the Professorship of Architectural Theory led by Anna-Maria Meister at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) is organizing a research brunch at the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz.
No colloquium, no lecture, no formalities: at our research brunch, we discuss work in progress in a relaxed setting. Across status groups and degrees of elaboration, researchers exchange ideas and projects in a constructive and cooperative atmosphere. Food and drink are provided, after all we want to nourish body and soul.
http://at.ekut.kit.edu/1290.php
Inaugural lecture, 10. July, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
Anna-Maria Meister will speak about "Coded Objects" in her inaugural lecture as Professor of Architectural Theory and Co-Director of SAAI on 10.07.24. This is not about the question of analog or digital, but about the design of our environment as aggregation of many things, whose form and impact we must critically question. Because the design of things, which in turn form architectures, is always also about shaping values - through aesthetic and material means. This means understanding them as the result of social, ecological, economic and aesthetic negotiations. This necessarily calls into question any separation between design and bureaucracy, as well as the assumptions of a "neutral" technology or innovative processes. Rather, it is about the substance of the narratives that have shaped and continue to shape such "coded objects".
EAHN International Conference, 19. – 23. June, Athens
At this year's EAHN International Conference in Athens, both Anna-Maria Meister and our collaborator Sina Brückner-Amin of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology / saai Archive are part of the roundtable "Data Narratives of Architectural Modernity", and our Postdoctoral Fellow Rebecca Carrai chairs the "Media and Object of the Home" session of the "Building Word Image" Interest Group.
http://eahn2024.arch.ntua.gr/