Mattias Malk

Category: Education

  • S*cial – Values in the built realm. Lecture and interview series

    S*cial – Values in the built realm. Lecture and interview series

    In the 2024 autumn semester, I was invited to curate the open lecture series of the Faculty of Architecture at the Estonian Academy of Arts. The invited lecturers focused on the ongoing shift in planning practice, where considerations other than pure economic viability increasingly play a role in decision-making. The resulting lecture are all available online in full (in English).

    In addition, I conducted interviews with each of the presenters, which were then published in SIRP. Here are the links to each full text(in Estonian)and lecture:

    Jonas Janke (with Arno Brandlhuber), lecture, article.

    Elina Alatalo, lecture, article.

    Christian Pagh, lecture, article.

    Petra Marko, lecture, article.

  • Baltic Lines presentation @ISSP

    Baltic Lines presentation @ISSP

    A talk at the ISSP in Riga for the opening of the Baltic Lines artistic research network that I am also a part of.  

    Baltic Lines: Reflections on Urban Transformation and Connectivity Along Rail Baltic’s Passage is an artistic research network approaching Rail Baltic – an infrastructure megaproject aiming to integrate Baltic states into the European rail network. Baltic Lines network intends to follow and explore topics such as the concept of the Baltic region, archiving as political practice, documentation of megaprojects.

    My presentation was titled “Fail Baltic? Wrapping one’s head around Rail Baltic” and beyond introducing the Rail Baltic project, the concept of megaprojects, the work of imaginaries in planning etc, it looked into the particularities deriving from it being planned by the three Baltic countries. 

  • KRITIS conference presentation

    KRITIS conference presentation

    This was a conference presentation at the Urban Circulations conference organised by the KRITIS Research Training Group. The presentation was titled:  When the First Train Departs – Infrastructural Renewal and Structures of Expectations in Secondary Cities. Much of the presentation dealt with the second case in my PhD thesis. 

    The conference description, programme and report can be found here.

  • Talk on cities and mobility at STL

    Talk on cities and mobility at STL

    This was a short invited talk exploring urbanisation from the point of view of mobility for the Public Space and Choreography series hosted by Sõltumatu Tantsu Lava (Independent Dance Stage) in Tallinn, Estonia. The talk focused on how circulation and decisions about movement (who moves, what moves, whereto, how and who decides?) are fundamental to how cities have developed. 

    Making parallels between urban planners and choreographers was one strategy here as the talk was aimed at instigating new choreographic dance in the public space. 

    More information about STL and the programme here.

  • DOCONF presentation

    DOCONF presentation

    A conference presentation at DOCONF 2021 in Budapest. DOCONF is an international doctoral / postdoctoral conference in architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, and planning organized by the Department of Urban Planning and Design, Faculty of Architecture, Budapest University of Technology and Economics (BME).

    My presentation was in the panel of shrinking cities and focused on developing the term “secondary cities” in the context of urban hierarchies in the Baltics and the change Rail Baltic is set to bring in Pärnu.

    The link to the proceedings with the conference article is here.

  • Next Stop Pop-up exhibition

    Next Stop Pop-up exhibition

    This was a pop-up exhibition of student works. MA Urbanism year I students presented the results of the Art and the City studio I conduct. This year the studio focused on the future Rail Baltic Tallinn terminal building designed by Zaha Hadid Architects. The futuristic station is set to become a hypermobile node, possibly shifting the centre of the city towards the south, away from the sea.

    Student works ranged from social analysis of the adjoining areas, a proposal for a bench-pavilion of petty crime and a handbook for living next to a construction site to musings on the meaning of connectivity, the smart city and how past and present are simultaneously manifest in the urban fabric.

  • EASA Apathy Residency

    EASA Apathy Residency

    This was a workshop I ran together with architect Rasmus Pikk. Entitled: “How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Apathy”, it took place 10.08.2020 as part of the European Architecture Students’ Assembly 2020 Summer School in Valga. The whole event was centred around the topic of “Apathy” – what does it mean for architects, for cities, societies and individuals and what to do with it. 

    The lecture portion focused on the role of narrative in architecture. We covered a series of key concepts including individual/collective, storyline and discourse coalition. Our aim was to employ these concepts in the workshop portion to enable a discussion about apathy with a critical eye on narrativity as the way we interact across the various scales and grades of society.

    The practical portion consisted of participants recording a monologue of their individual narratives on the topic of apathy. They were also asked to come up with a sound which represents the topic best for them. These recording were layered on top of each other and replayed in recurrent loops in the open air, creating a temporary discourse coalition. The outcome was less important for us as facilitators, than the attempt to offer an introspective moment in an otherwise intense and packed summer school format. I think this worked and was received well.

  • EASA Apathy Conference workshop

    EASA Apathy Conference workshop

    This was a workshop for the mini-conference organised by EASA Estonia in the runup to organising the EASA 2020 Summer School in Valga. The aim of the workshop was to open up a conversation about what can be understood as “apathy”, its use and meaning for architects and the material form it can take in the city. 

    Participants were asked to conduct a walk through Valga in a small group, identify one object which represents “apathy” for them, and construct an object biography for this item in the spirit of Arjun Appadurai and Caroline Knowles. These (fictional) stories were then presented as a speech, play, dialogue or visual narrative to the other groups over dinner. In addition to giving meaning to the architects’ exploration of the city, I found the biographies to present a wide array of interpretations of the overall topic. The participants seemed to have a great time too.

  • Urbiquity Urban Lab 2019 Tallinn

    Urbiquity Urban Lab 2019 Tallinn

    The Urban Lab is a workshop programme we developed with Urbiquity. This one took place in Tallinn, 9.-14. September in cooperation with the Tallinn Architecture Biennale and the Estonian Academy of Arts.

    The Urban Lab is a week-long visual urbanism residency. A programme of walks and talks, practice and theory will be carried out during the 6 days. The Urban Lab will culminate in an exhibition of all the resulting work in Tallinn. Additionally, a selection of the projects will be shown as part of a final showcase curated by Urbiquity.

    The Urban Lab residency creates experiences where urbanists from around the world can learn from and add to the local urban discourse. By learning about the specific urban struggles facing the city that derive from their specific geopolitical context, the participants will create new projects around the central theme. Urbiquity has created a week long programme for this exact purpose which includes talks, seminars, walks and urban interventions.

    More on the Urbiquity website.

  • IDA Radio interview

    IDA Radio interview

    This was a chat about cooperating with the 2019 Tallinn Architecture Biennale and teaching urbanism at the Estonian Academy of Arts. The chat is in Estonian. Thank you to host Teele Pehk for the invitation and for making this show happen. Thanks to Kirke Päss for the cooperation with TAB!

    IDA Radio is an independent radio based in Telliskivi, Tallinn. Operated out of a shipping container, it hosts a wide variety of shows offering all music for all tastes and a range of talkshows to boot. 

    Check them out at: https://idaidaida.net/
    The link to the particular show here.