The students have studied the Hasselt Beguinage and Z33 Art Museum through various manual “tactics”. The site and its architecture has been explored in various ways.

The first part formulates the first way in which the students are studying the site. In the first 3 weeks of the programme, the Beguinage and its wider context are studied for anomalies or intriguing folds in orthographic plans or aerial pictures. The students are encouraged to address their tactic skills, and by that to ignore computer-controlled instruments in these first few weeks of the semester.

The second part of the seminar is introduced with a workshop on hand drawing. In preparation of the visit the students will work on observational skills and how to capture these on paper. The actual visit of the Beguinage and Z33 is about representing intangible qualities which are not visible in plan, section or photographs. The field notes developed from this trip are the second layer of representing the Beguinage and are not meant to be ‘finished’.

During the third part the students are challenged to combine the impressions of the previous exercises in axonometric hand drawings of selected parts from the site. These kind of projections have the benefits of being measurable and at the same time offering a view on 3 surfaces. Atmospheric characteristics specific to the topic should be transferred through the drawing.

As a last exercise the students are allowed to use their computers again to create a new view on the site through collage techniques. Individual experiences and interpretations are the basis of this exercise, which resulted in a wide variety of surrealistic imagery.