Projects
2023
UNEARTHED
The Domestication of Marble
13:19 • Drama and Athens, Greece • Produced by Huma Gupta
Set in the cities of Drama and Athens in Greece, the research and film contrast contemporary fast-paced methods of marble extraction and fabrication with slower, ancient practices of working stone.
As processes of automation and acceleration intensify across the architectural industry, the distance between construction and material source expands. This condition produces a growing detachment from the origins of materials, and from the labor, energy, and environmental transformation embedded within them.
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The work returns to marble as both matter and record, following its movement from quarry to site and the systems that organize its transformation. It considers how speed and standardization alter not only production but also perception, shifting stone from a situated geological material into a detached architectural surface.
Directed and edited by Laura-India Garinois
Research and travel supported by AKPIA at MIT
Research and travel supported by AKPIA at MIT
fig.1 Marble quarry
fig.2 Production factory
fig.3 Water-intensive marble cutting process
fig.4 Dust collected from marble production
fig.5 Hand-carved marble sculptures by local artist
fig.6 Marble block cutting producing dust