During a conversation with ESR forensic scientist Douglas Elliot, three areas of forensic science emerge which can be related to architectural design.
1. Reconstruction of Event
2. The Laboratory
3. Archiving / Databank
1. Reconstruction of Event
After the event, the forensic team arrives at the ‘scene of the crime’ as quickly as possible.
Through careful collection and observation of objects and their relative positions on the site, a past event, or narrative, is reconstructed by the scientists. Invisible traces and residues of bodies and actions are made visible or made explicit through techniques of chemical staining.
The scene is divided into ‘hot, warm and cold’ areas, the spatial framework of a laboratory and auxiliary functions are overlaid onto the scene.
Hot is the area of investigation & examination, this is the ‘laboratory’, warm is for storage of equipment, cold is for discussion and eating etc.
2. The Laboratory
In the laboratory, it’s auxiliary rooms and circulation spaces, a strict order of control and safety is adhered to because of the sensitive, mobile nature of the evidence, DNA.
The analysis of the evidence, not only can be interpreted in plan as an architectural layout of rooms and circulation, but also the techniques of analysis can be transferred to the process of design.
For example, analysis of evidence to obtain a DNA profile, is a way of visualising DNA in an abstracted manner, here in a graph format. The person can be identified through matching this graph to the DNA profiles in the archive. One could say the invisible (person) is made present though the drawing – here the drawing is the computer generated graph.
A second technique is the re-staging of possible actions which may have caused patterns at the crime scene. The restaging is captured by slow motion camera, and ‘splatter’ patterns observed. Time-based methods document the dynamic patterns of the event.
3. DNA Databank
ESR is the custodian of the National DNA Databank. This is an electronic archive of DNA profiles, collected from individuals.
Is there a near-future possibility of storing information on DNA? DNA is the most compact format onto which one can to write and store information. It can survive for long periods of time without special climatic requirements. DNA will not have to undergo reformatting as technology changes, DNA will never become obsolete.
Future practice may be a Mobile Laboratory, where DNA profiles can be revealed on site. DNA may soon be analysed to determine where in the body the blood came from, and potentially reveal characteristics of the individual – race, height, hair colour.
Reconstruction of an event is a feature of forensics, archaeology, performance, and architecture. It evokes the ‘archival impulse’ identified by Hal Foster (2002).
Michael Shanks, Professor of Archaeology at Stanford, describes archaeology as ‘an ecology of mobilizing resources, managing, organizing, persuading, of practices like collecting, walking, and intervening in the land.’ (Shanks, 2001: p.50)
He states:
‘So archaeologists do not happen upon or discover the past… archaeologists … take up and make something of what is left of the past. Archaeology may be seen as a mode of cultural production.’ (p.50)
An argument which brings us close to the interpretive and creative process of architectural design.
Shanks utilizes performance as a method to investigate the past: ‘Performance and archaeology favour body, object and place, activity and context… Both performance and archaeology work with fragment and with trace.’ (p.55) Additionally, he notes the ‘Plurality of event. Many different, sometimes contradictory and divergent, narratives are generated’ (p.60)
The connections between the disciplines is evident in etymological roots, Michael Shanks also writes:
‘archive - architecture - archaeology
The prefix arche (found in archive and architecture and archaeology) is Greek for beginning, origin, foundation, source, first principle, first place of power, authority, sovereignty. It represents a starting point or founding act in both an ontological sense ("this is whence it began") and a nomological sense ("this is whence it derives its authority").
Archives are all about narratives of origin, identity and belonging, and the politics of ownership, organization, access and use.’
From http://michaelshanks.org/
The analogies between forensic science and architecture prompt us to speculate, what would a Mobile Laboratory for Architecture be, and what new instruments could it contain for investigation of site? What forensic methods can architects draw on to expand their definition of site analysis and what kind of time-based documentation will be required? How can architects, like archaeologists, make visible an invisible narrative?
Reference:
Theatre/Archaeology by Mike Pearson and Michael Shanks (Apr 27, 2001)
http://www.mshanks.com/figure-and-ground/
