ARTFEED — Contemporary Art Intelligence

Claying Architecture Explores Clay's Role in Robotic and Digital Fabrication

publication · 2026-10-22

*Claying Architecture: Making Machine and Material Kin* is a new publication priced at $50 from Applied Research & Design. This book includes insights from experts in digital fabrication, such as Shelby Doyle and Kelley Van Dyck Murphy. It delves into the relationship between clay, robotics, and cutting-edge computing, structured around five core themes: embedding, surfacing, recessing, assembling, and enclosing. The text also addresses topics like cultural significance, human-machine interaction, and multi-species architecture, promoting empathetic approaches to design. A review of this work has been authored by Galo Canizares.

Key facts

  • Claying Architecture: Making Machine and Material Kin is published by Applied Research & Design, priced at $50
  • The volume is edited by Shelby Doyle, Frank Melendez, Jonathan Scelsa, and Kelley Van Dyck Murphy
  • Contents are organized around five themes: embedding, surfacing, recessing, assembling, and enclosing
  • The book asks what working with clay means in the age of robotics and advanced computation
  • Shelby Doyle says the premise is that architecture has much to learn from clay and its technical and cultural configurations
  • Recurring terms include natural intelligence, ancestral intelligence, and material intelligence
  • The book discusses robotic extruders, digital simulations, and 3D printing alongside multi-species concerns
  • The review is written by Galo Canizares, author of Digital Fabrications: Designer Stories for a Software-Based Planet

Entities

Artists

  • Shelby Doyle
  • Frank Melendez
  • Jonathan Scelsa
  • Kelley Van Dyck Murphy
  • N. Katherine Hayles
  • Galo Canizares

Institutions

  • Applied Research & Design

Sources