ISRAEL - JERUSALEM

One thing I was looking forward to about the semester abroad was working in a new environment. Both spatially and socially. Because in Liechtenstein I am by now familiar with a lot of things. I know the atelier and some of the students who work there regularly, the cafeteria and the library, and I know how the lectures and especially the reviews in the Studio work. Even though this is very comfortable, I wanted to see what it would be like somewhere else, in my case at the Bezalel.

 First of all, I expected to study at the new campus, designed by SANAA, together with the other departments and thereby have an exchange with other design students. But as it turned out, the architecture department is located in a separate building complex directly in the centre of West Jerusalem. So it's not much different from studying in Liechtenstein.

 What is different, however, is the way they work there. For one thing, there are many small rooms, so you hear or see little or nothing of the other Studios. Especially if you don't know any of the Israeli or Palestinian students. And even these small rooms don't belong to just one Studio, but are only used for the reviews. The walls are then often full of other projects. Because during the week, you just go and look for a free table to work on. I found that a bit of a downside, as it means you rarely work at the university, but mainly sit at your desk at home.

 As the end of the semester came closer, nevertheless, I started to meet up with a fellow student (also an exchange student), as we missed our usual way of working and exchanging ideas. The problem was, however, that by now most of the tables were cluttered with models. Accordingly, we were always sitting somewhere else, sometimes even in the library, which I had never done in Liechtenstein. That was also nice, because you could always grab some books and flip through them, but you didn't have the opportunity to hang up all your drawings together to get a better overview of your project.

 Also the work itself, especially in the courses I took besides the Studio, were much looser. For example, there was no weekly assignment to be done, but just an idea with a basic framework on a certain topic for the whole semester. What the students would make of it in group work, was completely open, though. In the end, we showed moving sections, while other groups created collages, models or an interactive media application.

 If this work had not been done in a group, I would probably have had great difficulties. But through the cooperation and help of others, I was even able to get to know new possibilities of visualisation. I realised that I am not particularly variable when it comes to certain ways of working and proceeding. As soon as it goes out of my comfort zone, I need some support.

Similarly with the spatial aspect. Instead of adapting and only working at home, my fellow student and I decided that we wanted to find a new place to sit at the university every day. And even though I see some disadvantages in this, I soon got used to wandering around the whole building every morning looking for workplaces.