Rumple Zone investigates a new order, one at the intersection of multiple opposing forces: organic versus computational, hand versus machine, and biological versus mechanical. The installation is constructed out of powder-coated aluminum cut into geometries that are at once the form and the structure. This union of aesthetic and structural methodologies was tested in previous sculptural installations. Here, the assembly reanimates a lowly corner condition and small reveal—amplifying a minor flaw in the building’s architecture.

Installed in an interior hallway at the University of Southern California School of Architecture, Rumple Zones demonstrates how complementary artistic and architectural practices support and reinforce each other at Vertebrae. This sculpture was designed using the spatial computing tools of architecture, parametric algorithms tailored to produce sequential formal changes in the parts. The outcome is a set of unique, but related geometry that follows an ordered set of rules. In an intuitive, artistic intervention, the geometries are then edited by hand introducing moments of disorder without breaking the system.

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