Venice 2023 Architecture Biennale Exhibition: Towards an Aerial Additive Manufactured Architecture

Exhibit in Palazzo Bembo, Time-Space-Existence EXHIBITION CURATED BY THE European Capital of Culture, Venice.

Venice 2023 Architecture Biennale Exhibition: Towards an Aerial Additive Manufactured Architecture
"Time Space Existence", Palazzo Bembo, Venice, 20th May - 26th November 2023
Curators: European Capital of Culture

The construction industry is adopting additive manufacturing (AM) technologies for onsite construction due to their ability to reduce the time and cost of building. On-site AM typically involves the continuous extrusion of horizontal layers of material using a gantry larger than the build volume, to move a single extruder mechanism. Transporting and installing such gantry systems limits AM to easily accessible sites. In contrast, Aerial Additive Manufacturing (Aerial AM) enables swarm-based, parallel manufacturing in remote or hard-to-access locations, providing greater flexibility and boundless manufacturing. Having recently published in Nature a demonstration of the world’s first Aerial AM with cementitious and composite materials in-flight (Zhang et al. 2022), ongoing research includes enhancements to the manufacturing approach and a series of architectural design demonstrations of the technology through simulation and/or physical manufactured outcomes.

Aerial AM research was recently exhibited at the 2023 Venice Biennale of Architecture, several videos of Aerial AM technology were featured adjacent to architectural designs developed using the same robot control framework in simulation to speculate on the potential of aerial additively manufactured architecture. Two projects were presented: a tower of near-infinite height (Ander et al. 2019) and a large-span shell (Stuart-Smith, Darekar, et al. 2023). Both explore the logistical and aesthetic possibilities of an unbounded swarm-constructed architecture that is partially designed through the act of aerial swarm construction.

Credits:
Institutions: University of Pennsylvania, Imperial College London, University College London, University of Bath, and Empa.
Aerial AM Venice Biennale Exhibition: Robert Stuart-Smith, Mirko Kovac, Franklin (Renhu) Wu, Yusuf Furkan Kaya, Lachlan Orr, and Adam Blood.
Aerial AM Shell: Robert Stuart-Smith, Patrick Danahy, Mirko Kovac, and Vijay Pawar.
Aerial AM Tower: Robert Stuart-Smith, Chris Williams, Paul Shepherd, Vijay Pawar, Mirko Kovac, Andrew Homick, and Patrick Danahy.
Aerial AM Project leaders: Mirko Kovac, Robert Stuart-Smith, Stefan Leutenegger, Vijay Pawar, Chris Williams, Paul Shepherd, and Richard Ball. For more information, See Zhang et al., Nature, 609, no. 7928 (2022): 709-717.

The Autonomous Manufacturing Lab (AML) explores the integration of robotic manufacturing and construction within architectural design. The AML aims to reduce the environmental and economic costs of design and production while enhancing their cultural and aesthetic impact. The lab's integrative methods for generative design and manufacturing are developed as semi-autonomous systems, exploring possibilities for artisanal-like craftsmanship to be scaled to large production volumes. This approach provides greater specificity and enhanced aesthetic character in design responses compared to traditional automated methods, whilst also reducing material use and waste within bespoke design and production processes. The AML's research enhances design and production capabilities across diverse manufacturing methods and materials by developing industrial and mobile robot fabrication techniques, multi-agent systems, AI/machine learning computational approaches, and applications of real-time sensor and computer vision technologies. This multidisciplinary research includes the development of Aerial Additive Manufacturing, recently published in Nature, which demonstrates the world’s first in-flight additive manufacturing by cooperating drones, representing a rapidly deployable form of collective robotic construction.

University of Pennsylvania Weitzman School of Design
The Weitzman School of Design prepares students to address complex sociocultural and environmental issues through thoughtful inquiry, creative expression, and innovation. As a diverse community of scholars and practitioners, we are committed to advancing the public good–both locally and globally–through art, design, planning, and preservation.

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Venice 2023 Architecture Biennale Exhibition: Towards an Aerial Additive Manufactured Architecture