Curated by Brittany Utting
Entangled within the Earth’s five natural spheres—the atmosphere, biosphere, cryosphere, hydrosphere, and lithosphere—is a sixth: the technosphere. Identified by geologist Peter K. Haff as an emerging paradigm of the Anthropocene, the technosphere includes the infrastructures of industrial production and extraction.
Image gallery
OPEN-GROUND, 2024
Architecture is part of the technosphere, hardening its systems and multiplying its forms. Encompassing factories and farmlands, ports and telecommunication networks, mines and landfills, highways and suburbs, the technosphere is more than just the accumulated material of the built environment. It is a global enmeshment of physical infrastructures, geopolitical relations, and digital networks, enabling the continuous movement of matter, energy, and information.
Featuring architectural projects from eighteen international practices, including Andrés Jaque / OFFPOLINN, Olalekan Jeyifous, and Dogma, The Sixth Sphere exhibition explores planetary forms of design thinking, leveraging the cumulative power of the technosphere to imagine more viable climate futures.
Exhibition
The Sixth Sphere exhibition, curated by Brittany Utting, and accompanying publication explore how design can participate in systems of planetary interdependence and reciprocity. Gathering digital renderings, drawings, photographs, maps, collages and an animation from eighteen international practices, The Sixth Sphere positions the technosphere as a collective site to reconstruct our social, technical, and climate futures.
The works are structured in three sections and scales—Molecular, Machinic, and Metabolic. These frameworks “are nested within each other, pointing to the transscalar capacities of creative action. For example, the machinic conversion of matter into energy alters a metabolic process through molecular transformations; each act of design is at once geophysical, sociotechnical, and territorial,” explains curator Brittany Utting
- Exhibition period: 24.05. to 02.07.2025
Opening hours
Mon, 13:00 - 17:00
Tue, Wed + Fri, 11:00 - 18:30, Thu 11:00 - 20:00
Sunday and public holiday, 13:00 - 17:00
Location: Aedes Architecture Forum
Christinenstr. 18-19
10119 Berlin
