Paper short abstract:

How to design compounds to involve, and how compounds involve us? The involvements that emerged in the design and construction of an infrastructure to make air pollution sensible reveal the interdependence of compounds and their entanglements with embodied and affective experiences.

Paper long abstract:

Toxic compounds like air pollution, tend to be analysed in isolation, and their relations with other entities studied one to one. However, to measure, make visible, or remediate some compounds, other ones are always put in place, even if rarely accounted for. Drawing on the design and construction of an urban infrastructure to measure, make visible and remediate particulate matter (PM2.5) through a water vapour cloud we installed at the Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism 2017, I will inquire the design decisions made to intensify people's engagement with air pollution through a new air/water atmospheric compound, and the construction process of its infrastructure.

Thinking through involvement permits to recognize the various states, scales and locations in which air and water got intertwined with each other, as well as with other materials, spaces, humans and technologies, where to understand their own affordances and demands, their inter dependencies need to be foregrounded. Thinking through involvement also contributes to account for the embodied and affective experiences that got entangled with/through compounds, and how these sparked unexpected controversies, resources control or conflict management. How can we design compounds to involve, and how compounds involve us? What does it take to make the air visible? Which new narratives about air pollution might this approach contribute to?