Animatescrapers expands architecture’s subjectivity.

Architecture is historically conceptualized as fixed, stationary, and inert. Alongside discussions that restrict subjectivity to humans, architectural discourse often positions buildings and cities as inanimate objects that might be operated on by exclusively human actors. However, in today’s world, houses speak in first person via social media, caricatures of buildings stand in for complex forces of gentrification, and components of the built environment play the role of lead and supporting actors in films, theatre, and literature. This issue of SOILED tells stories that amplify architecture’s position as an animate actor—a companion to humans and nonhumans with its own representational, material, and ontological agency in the world.

Andrew Schachman draws the city’s plumbing infrastructure without building enclosures.
Kevin Coval chronicles bodily encounters with public water fixtures.

Joyce Hwang projects curious synanthropic environments for our cat companions.
Deke Weaver recounts the mythic superpowers of feline megafauna and mascots.

Office Andorus queers the column, with a little help from John Outram and Freddy Mamani.
Sneha Gantla uncovers the long-distance love story of two smitten and exuberant architects.

Adrianne Joergensen visually interviews a series of Javanese volcano landscapes.
Matthew Harlan typesets volcano names to rebrand our quotidian correspondence with geology.