Architectural Territories: Medieval Strategies in a Globalizing World
Ashley Bigham
Yale UniversityOctober 17, 2014
Center for Urban History, Lviv
From the fortresses of the Middle Ages to today’s global infrastructures, territorial forms remain a global trail that architects, urban designers and historians can exploit and employ. Inspired by the fortresses and castles of Galicia, this research examines defensive architecture from the Middle Ages to present-day. Recent trends in globalization have highlighted the importance of studying these structures. Through careful examination of architectural form, methodologies, and history it is easy to see comparisons between fortress architecture in Ukraine and contemporary defense architecture all over the world.
Like the Middle Ages, today’s political structures are fragmented. Political authority is exercised by a range of overlapping organizations including religious bodies, nations, city-states, and transnational corporations. This lecture examined stories of architecture and territory throughout the history of globalization. How is architecture responding to the current sociopolitical shift toward the organizational structures of the Middle Ages? What can we learn from medieval history that will help us face our own current defense crisis?
Ashley Bigham
is a Fulbright Fellow in architecture currently researching historic city fortification systems near Lviv. She is a recent graduate with a Master of Architecture from the Yale University School of Architecture. In addition to her studies at Yale, Ashley’s teaching experiences include a teaching fellowship with Professor Dolores Hayden at Yale University and an Adjunct Lecturer position at the University of Tennessee. Professionally, she has practiced at MOS, an inter-disciplinary architecture firm based in New York and Gray Organschi Architecture in New Haven.
Ashley’s research in Ukraine will focus on the preservation and modern adaptation of historic fortification structures in the Galicia region. Her work will focus on the cultural and architectural identity of the structures by examining their modern context.
