The Secret of the Zoo Exposed

Abstract

The zoo has always been an institution that simultaneously functions as a garden of escape and a miniature city. Starting off with this observation, the thesis investigates the zoo’s urban and architectural implications and proposes an urban model that works with nature in a seamless manner. It explores the possibilities of a homogeneous field in light of contemporary architectural practices and challenges the discipline of architectural composition through its critique of a long-lasting figure-ground tendency. The project operates within various scales: the flexible urban system is further defined through a series of specific architectural interventions.

By proposing to substitute all captive animals with sound and digital projections, the thesis ends with a search for the zoo’s potential role in the era of an ongoing mass extinction. The absence captured by the imagery aims to draw attention to this fragile reality through the juxtaposition of temporary structures and permanent landscape.