An exhibition of new work by ESALA academics Professor Mark Dorrian and Adrian Hawker, made with support from CAD-CAM technician Richard Collins and Owen Nichols and Clara Syme of a83 gallery, has opened in New York City’s SoHo district.

The exhibition, titled The Sixth Somewhat Annual Meeting, is taking place at the a83 and encompasses new and re-imagined work by 16 people, including Mark and Adrian. Mark and Adrian have been working with this same group for over six years and their membership is spread across the globe.

The a83 gallery’s mission is to “exhibit, publish and promote experimental projects in architecture, art, and design”.

Adrian said: “Under our collective name METIS, Mark and I have been engaging with the other contributors to this exhibition for a number of years through discussions, archive visits, exhibitions, publications and public events. For the a83 piece, Storm Gallery, we collaborated with Richard Collins for the fabrication of the lightbox constructions which we are displaying alongside a new silkscreen print.”

Work inspired by damaged drawings

Storm Gallery explores the internal topographies of a sedimented and compacted pile of water-damaged drawings – silkscreen transparencies produced for the printing of Venturi, Rauch and Scott-Brown’s plans for the National Gallery extension in London. 

These were stained during the passage of Hurricane Irene across the eastern seaboard of the US in 2011. Ferrous water from drainage pipes spilled over the drawings and mould developed in the intervening years. The drawings stuck together and began to transfer marks onto one another. Mark and Adrian unpeeled and unfolded the damaged drawings and created four new layers which were then directly used to form a new silkscreen print.

Each lightbox construction is comprised of a folded transparency, carved oak frame and cast bronze object, and corresponds to one of the 18 gallery rooms that make up the National Gallery extension. Six of these are shown in the New York exhibition.

Supporting research and teaching at ECA

An interest in the generative potential of architectural representation has been a constant feature of Mark and Adrian’s research and teaching. This has been explored through speculative design projects, exhibitions, and installations such as the multimedia piece Northroom, a collaboration with the artist Victoria Clare Bernie. In its exploration of an expanded conception of drawing, Storm Gallery is closely connected to these concerns. Mark and Adrian joined participants in a public round table discussion at New York’s Cooper Union and the entire exhibition will be documented in a special issue of the journal Architectural Design, due to be published in November 2025.

Richard said: "It is always a pleasure working with Mark and Adrian. This type of open-ended, creative exploration of materials, technologies and techniques always results in exciting and unexpected outcomes. The knowledge and experience that I develop throughout the development phases of these projects feeds directly into the day-to-day teaching and research of our workshops and my engagement with our students.”

The a83 gallery has published a limited edition of prints from the exhibition. You can find out more about these and the exhibition on the a83 website.