South Dongfeng Road, Zhengdong New District, Zhengzhou, Henan, China PR 450008
PART 01 | INTERACTION
Tianxia Jia (Mr) 2022-2025 Selected Works
"
CONTENTS Comprehensive Work
The Queen of The South
An Immersive&Interactive Sonic&Visual Performance
Skills Portfolio
An Overall Demonstration of Skills with Projects
3D Modeling & Rendering
Graphic Design
Data Collection
Processing & Visualization
UI Design & AIGC
People ignore design that ignores people. "
——Frank Chimero
The Queen of The South: An Immersive Visual-Auditory Interactive Performance
FOLD, London, UK
Master, Spring 2025
Instructor:
Paul Bavister
The Queen of the South 2025 is an interactive visual-auditory project created by Wrench² Studio, which is invited to participate in the annual event of FOLD Studio: Future Shock Chapter Three: "Abyssal" on behalf of UCL Interactive Lab, inspired by Alvin Lucier’s original experimental piece The Queen of the South (1972) . The project draws on the research of Alvin Lucier that combines sound, vibrating surfaces, improvisation, and visual feedback. It combines contemporary advanced visual-auditory technologies and AI technologies, focusing on exploring the interaction between sound and the material world, as well as the real-time interactive experience centered on users. The purpose of this project is to showcase the innovative integration of physical acoustics, interactive sound control, visual art and AI visual processing. It aims to provide an immersive real-time feedback experience for the audience, connecting interactive behaviors with sound and vision, and giving space for audiences to re-create through interaction.
About "The Queen of The South" 1972 & 2025
"The Queen of The South" 1972 is an experimental art music piece composed by Alvin Lucie. It was commissioned by Gerald Shapiro and the New Music Ensemble of New York in 1972 to provide visual expression in conjunction with their music performances. Alvin Lucie conducted experiments based on the research of 18th-century German physicist Ernst Chladni regarding the visualization of sound waves, focusing on sound, vibrating surfaces, improvisation, and visual feedback. This project mainly aimed to explore how sound interacts with the material world and utilized different materials to visually express the music works of the New Music Ensemble through Chladni Figures.
"The Queen of The South" 2025 builds upon Alvin Lucie's creation and combines modern advanced visual-auditory technology and AI techniques to extend and develop this work. The aim is to create a real-time feedback immersive interactive experience.
About FOLD
FOLD is an artist-led and community-driven studio and art space, aiming to create and showcase designs that are committed to establishing a building and protection ecosystem for the design industry. Future Shock Chapter Three: "Abyssal" is an annual event of FOLD. It invites multiple designers and artists to jointly plan and utilize its gallery space to present a multi-projected, continuous immersive interactive performance experience. In this event wrench2 studio is invited to participate on behalf of UCL Interactive Lab.
The event divides the FOLD gallery space into multiple consecutive parts. "The Queen of The South" 2025 is displayed in the stream room, serving as a fixed performance venue throughout the entire event, providing the audience with a 5-hour continuous visual-auditory immersive interactive experience.
Ernst Chladni's Experiment 1787 Chladni Figures
Poster of Future Shock Chapter Three: "Abyssal" FOLD Stream Room
Layout × FOLD Club Stream Room
When arranging the FOLD Stream Room, we first referred to Gernot Bohme's spatial Atmospheric aesthetics (1993) to conduct a systematic analysis of its spatial characteristics. We believe that the space of this venue emphasizes depth perception and is suitable for linear system arrangement. Based on the logic of the design itself, we finally formed an overall arrangement featuring point-like interface - linear visual narration - surround sound system. As the long table and the projections serves as the foundational platform where sound-driven visual patterns emerge, its overall form and layout conform to the longitudinal and narrow spatial aesthetics of the Fold Steam Room, providing an environment that harmonizes with the surrounding space and enhances the overall immersive experience.
CONPONENTS:
1 CNC-manufactured mechanical hand
2 Steel support structure
3 LED programmed light strips
4 The long table
5 Foam Board
6 Sand grains
7 Projectors
8 Multi-layered screens
9 Webcams and standers
Project Diagram
Receiving real-time audio data from Max/MSP, exciters convert audio to physical vibration, exhibiting Chladni figures through sand plates.
Part 1: Interface
Arduino receives data from the potentiometers and sends it to PC1/Max MSP to generate realtime changing music, which is played through audio system. PC4 receives live images from webcam for further processing using SreamDiffusion AI model, then send AI processed video to projectors.
Using potentiometers to control systems such as sound and lighting, the interface bridges the physical and virtual worlds. It engages with the audience in an intuitive way, inviting participants to co-create and shape the performance together.
Arduino receives data from the potentiometers and sends it to PC2/LightingStudio to generate real-time changing lighting, which is composed of LED strips and spotlights.
Gerald Shapiro
Part 01: Interface
The Mechanical Hand: Potentiometer × Arduino
For the conceptual design of the interface, we referred to the underlying logic in The Queen of The South 1972. As mentioned before, its main purpose is visual expression of the performance of the New Music Ensemble of New York. Therefore, the conductor of the ensemble is the one who controls the advancement of the performance, using hand gestures to control the development and variation of the music, thus the Chladni figures. With the same logic, in The Queen of The South 2025, the interface is equivalent to the conductor, controlling the development and variation of the audio and visuals during
The design of the mechanical hand is mainly divided into two parts: the structural part and the sensor system. The structural part is further divided into the base and the fingers. The base is made by welding standard-sized steel pipes processed by a bandsaw; The fingers are designed based on the kinematic chain of linkage-joints structure, mainly connecting the CNC-treated wooden and steel components together by riveting. For the sensor system, potentiometers installed on the two joints of each finger cooperate with Arduino to convert the joint angles resulting from user interaction into digital data and transmit it to the PC. the performance. Therefore, we ultimately chose the image of a hand, which would change its gesture through the interaction from the user, using the concrete image of an abnormal-scale hand to facilitate the user's understanding of the function of the interface while enhancing its presence and visual impact.
New Music Ensemble of New York
Part 02: From Interface to Audio
Audio System: Max/MSP × Arduino
The generation principle of Chladni Figures is that when sound waves reach the sand plates, they will propagate within the plates and rebound upon hitting the edges, thus creating overlapping of sound waves throughout the plates. The sand particles tend to remain in the relatively less vibrating parts of the surface, thus forming figures.
Therefore, based on this principle, simpler and more regular waveform sounds, such as simple harmonic waves like sine waves and square waves, are more likely to produce clear and sharp graphics when interacting with each other on the plates. However, if more complex waveforms are used, such as noise waves, due to the smaller vibration differences or overly dense distribution of waveform changes, more turbid graphics will be produced. Therefore, from the perspective of graphic design, the simpler the waveform, the better. However, simple harmonic waves are often monotonous, and can cause discomfort to human ear after long-term playback in high frequency, which are not suitable for direct use in live performances. Therefore, after conducting sound design experiments, we ultimately used FM processed simple harmonic waves and divide them into 5 sound tracks with different imaging capabilities coresponding to 5 fingers of the interface, taking into account both visual and auditory considerations.
During the performance, the interaction between users and the interface will be transmitted in real time to Max/ MSP as digital data via Arduino. After processing, this data controls the message signal to frequency modulate the carrier signal, the simple harmonic waves, thereby creating FM-processed sound tracks that change in real time.
1: Arduino Data Collection
Arduino Data Remapping
Audio Data to Outputs (Audio Exciters & Speakers)
3: FM Processing using Arduino Data
4: Sound Track Generation
From Interface to Audio Principle
Part 03: From Audio to Visual
Physical Figures: The Long Table × Chladni Figures
The long table is the third part of the whole set, serving as a receiver of the preceding changing audio data generated by user interaction. Specifically designed to extend the performance of Alvin Lucier’s original experimental piece The Queen of the South (1972) based on Chladni Figures, the long table serves as the main physical visual medium. It receives the changing audio data and converts it into physical vibrations through audio exciters, which are then transmitted to the sand grains through the sand plates attached to the exciters, creating Chladni Figures that change in real time with the live music. As the long table serves as the foundational platform where sound-driven visual patterns emerge, its overall form and layout conform to the longitudinal and narrow spatial aesthetics of the Fold Steam Room, providing an environment that harmonizes with the surrounding space and enhances the overall immersive experience.
The Sand Plates & Chladni Figures
The generation principle of Chladni Figures is that when sound waves reach the sand plates, they will propagate within the sand table and rebound upon hitting the edges, thus creating overlapping of sound waves throughout the sand plates. The sand particles tend to remain in the relatively less vibrating parts of the surface, thereby forming clear patterns. In this case, the performance of Chladni Figures depends on two main aspects: the material and shape of the sand plates. In terms of material, we tested more than ten materials based on multiple indicators such as density, vibration conductivity, and bending resistance, and finally selected foam board for its balanced abilities. In terms of shape, we selected the combination of basic geometric shapes and irregular shapes for their different imaging characteristics as the final solution to showcase as many diverse Chladni Figure forms and variations as possible.
From Visual To Creation ！
The sand plates are not merely a visual expression; it also offers users more opportunities for interaction and creation. During the performance, we prepared various colored art sands for audiences and encouraged them to touch and feel the sand plates. Other than only observing, they could either sprinkle sand onto the sand table to create new graphics and color variations, or reach out to touch the sand plates and draw something on it. At this moment, the audiences also became part of this performance and became the co-creators of this interactive art.
Part 04: Visual Recreation
Digital Figures: TouchDesigner
× StreamDiffusion
The visual transformation of sound in Alvin Lucier's work carries a key meaning: a form of reinterpretation. In our remaking of this piece, we aim to integrate modern technologies within the context of a contemporary remake, presenting a new perspective on the re-interpretation of sound images. Alvin believed that the graphic representation of sound waves—the process of making the invisible visible— reflects a profound understanding and detailed observation of the world. This kind of thinking provides us with an entry point for visual creation - the micro world. Meanwhile, through our in-depth communication with FOLD, we believe that the locality of visual creation is also particularly important, and decided to combine them.
With the help of real-time AI generation tools, we are able to endow abstract sand-plate figures with more concrete details and visual impact, thereby enhancing the depth of observation and re-translation. This deepening aligns with Alvin’s original intention and contemporary re-interpretation of micro world, offering the audience the possibility of deeper reflection. Therefore, we ultimately chose to introduce StreamDiffusion/TD. By leveraging real-time AI generation technology, we transferred information from webcam capture, and applied FOLD’s visual elements in post-processing, resulting in the final visuals.
Concept Image: The Micro World
"A microscopic world in motion, created by vibrating sound waves, forming everchanging abstract shapes, realistic texture, greyish bacteria-like structures, ultradetailed, cinematic lighting, macro photography, photorealistic, 8K render, depth of field, bioluminescent glow particles, organic fractal patterns, science fiction atmosphere"
Image from Webcam
Realtime Generation & Image Processing
For the exhibition, a multi-layer projection suspended above the long table is used to enhances the three-dimensionality of vsiuals and strengthen the correspondence between the physical figures and digital graphics
AI image After StreamDiffusion
2D Processed (Bump Texture)
3D Processed (Micro Structure)
Multi-layer Projection
FOLD Visual Reference
Main Objects
FOLD, London, 2025/03/20
Audience Interaction
"Good interactive design gives the user a sense of power that is easy to understand and makes the user the co-creator." —— Jim Nielsen
Project Demonstration: UCL B-Made Robotic Lab Promotional Video 2025
This project is a collaborative effort between UCL Interactive Lab and B-Made Robotic Lab. The project's focus is on the visual presentation and promotion of B-Made Robotic Lab. I participated in the project's planning and independently utilized Cinema 4D software in conjunction with Redshift rendering & Adobe Premiere to complete the promotional video “From nothing to everything”, which covers the stages from concept design to 3D model creation, rendering, and animation script and production.ding an environment that harmonizes with the surrounding space and enhances the overall immersive experience.
Skills Set: STATA Regression Analysis and Data Modeling & K-means/SOM clustering algorithm & Principal Component Analysis (PCA) & Grasshopper 3D Data Visualization
Project Demonstration: Research and Design of Ecological Metro Town Based on Big Data Processing 2023
This project is a comprehensive research aimed at addressing the trend of rapid urban expansion in China, and leveraging big data collection and analysis to solve existing problems in new urban area planning and explore data-based urban design solutions. The project takes the Qiaoling New District in Nanjing, China as the research object. Firstly, it focuses on GIS urban big data along the subway hotspots and collects, classifies, and normalizes it. Based on the world-leading ecological city indicators, it calculates its value score. Thus, we input the data reference node-place model into the machine learning, and then conduct K-means/SOM result clustering on it. Finally, the results are modelled and visualized in 2D and 3D using STATA/ Grasshopper software to provide reference for the urban planning zoning and construction regarding key indicators such as subway hotspots, urban density, and green coverage rate. This project has received support from the local government, and it has referred to the actual planning drawings and schemes of Qiaoling New Town. During the implementation process, it has also reported and communicated with multiple urban planners in real-time.g an environment that harmonizes with the surrounding space and enhances the overall immersive experience.
This project is a rapid construction camp project focusing on parametric prefabricated building modules, led by the Computational Design Laboratory of the School of Architecture of Southeast University and involving a school-enterprise cooperation. I participated in the entire process of the project and was responsible for the UI construction of the project website. The website prototype was designed and produced using Figma software. It structures the product description, theoretical background, core technologies, construction process, etc. through a clear framework and promotes the project to both B-end and C-end markets.ing an environment that harmonizes with the surrounding space and enhances the overall immersive experience.
This project is a collaborative effort between UCL Interactive Lab and B-Made Robotic Lab. The project's focus is on the visual presentation and promotion of B-Made Robotic Lab. During the early stage of this project, I utilized Midjourney and ComfyUI to assist in visual design. By means of simple concepts and images, and through changing reference, keyword and seed, I could quickly generate a variety of visuals in batches to facilitate the selection and determination of the final solution and the rapid production of design materials, thereby enhancing the efficiency of design advancement.
01: References 02: Prompt
Seed & Settings
Image Generation
Batch Generation
Harvard Graduate School of Design, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
Research Assistant
Southeast University, Nanjing, China
Bachelor of Architecture
Mobile Phone: +86 13007526097 | +44 07550073763
Email: jiatianxia19991005@163.com
South Dongfeng Road, Zhengdong New District, Zhengzhou, Henan, China PR 450008
PORTFOLIO PART 02 | ARCHITECTURE
Tianxia Jia (Mr) 2018-2025 Selected Works
CONTENTS
" What the designer can give to our society that others cannot give, is to create a spirit. "
Main Works
Urban Fantasy: A House for the Artist Ⅱ
Conservatory for Reviving Vernacular Ecosystem:
Yangtze River Museum of Ecology and Geology
Rotating Modules: Prefabricated Residential Tower for Migrant Workers
Hive Modules: Robotics Research and Exhibition Center
——John Hejduk
Model of Nanjing, 1:1000, 2018
Unban Fantasy: A House for the Artist Ⅱ He Hua
Tang, Nanjing, China
Bachelor 4, Spring 2022
Instructor: Pan Hui
Under the research of roof variation and structure objectification with my partner, Tianyu Li, we applied our research in a project of housing for an artist. This is the second design completed individually by me. The site of the house is located in the He Hua Tang, which is in the old city in the south of Nanjing. The original building was demolished due to its aging structure. As a replacement, a two-story courtyard house is designed for Southeast University art Professor Zhao Jun. The building meets two functional requirements: living spaces and artist studio which can also be used as a small gallery.
Conceptual Exterior Render
F1
F2
DirectLight
The old city in Nanjing is cluttered and dense, and the environment is chaotic and disordered. The design strives to control various factors: sight, noise and lighting, so as to minimize the influence of surrounding environment on the life quality of the artist.
At the same time, the concrete structure balances functions and atmosphere of internal spaces in a coherent and artistic way.
Texture of City
In order to protect the urban texture of the old city, the design was developed based on both volume and height, to make sure that the house can perfectly integrate the plane fabric of the old city and the city skyline.
The high population density issue leads to the heavy distribution of the noise. The design aims to minimizes the impact of noise on the artist's life by means of structural sound insulation, optimization of window orientation and sound absorption of vegetation.
Lighting
Due to the lighting requirements of the special functions of the studio and gallery, the design makes the studio and gallery receive great lighting and keeps the users' sight away from the chaotic scene of the old city by controlling the structure and the orientation of windows.
Function
In order to meet different needs of residence and studio, the two functional spaces are superimposed and nested vertically to create two sets of continuous spaces with varying heights. At the same time, different functions are arranged orderly according to the change of privacy requirements.
Conservatory for
Reviving Vernacular Ecosystem:
Yangtze River Museum of Ecology and Geology
Mufu Mountain, Nanjing, China
Bachelor 4, Fall 2021
Instructor: Ge Ming
The project site locates in the riverside belt of Mufu Mountain, adjacent to the Yangtze River in the north. The project is designed to be the Yangtze River Museum of Ecology and Geology, aiming to protect and revive the ecological system of the Yangtze River.
Based on the terrain, the project massing has been raised up from the river to the mountain. The elevated part of the building was placed close to the ridge, so the volume of the building corresponds to the mountain. The building massing follows the trend of the valley and the Yangtze River in both plane and height, so as to show its respect for nature. The design introduces the mountain and water into the building, making the building a medium where mountains and rivers coexist.
Conceptual Exterior Render
The project site is located on the riverbank where the Mufu mountain and the Yangtze River meet. Inspired by the cross section of the site, the massing is designed to be elevated by three levels in general from the river to the mountain. The environment of the site also changes with elevation, from silt bank to mountain land.
The interior programs are divided into three parts corresponded to the three-level elevated massing. The independent spaces can be regarded as "rooms" connected and partly overlapped with one another to interact with each other, creating series of spatial systems.
Influenced by the topography of the environment, the themed exhibition spaces are placed from river to mountain environment as the terrain rises, using the traffic corridor located at the second elevation as the medium. While visiting, the themes of exhibitions echo with the environment outside, letting visitors experience the narration of nature.
Meanwhile, there are thousands of aquatic and terrestrial plants endemic to the Yangtze River growing around the site, which are living specimens of the Yangtze River ecosystem and its history. In this case, two elevated parts of the building are set up as greenhouses, which are used to cultivate and display them. S
Axonometric Diagram Design Processs
Spatial Organization
Section - Narration
The elevation of the building rises continuously from lower sea-level to higher. Series of interesting pedestrian circulations are designed for visitors to explore. While walking along the designed circulations, visitors will feel as if they are hiking in the wild and experiencing the narration of nature.
Two green houses are designed to be at the highest elevation, cultivating a variety of plants vernacular to the Yangtze River inside. Unique ecological landscape along the Yangtze River are here for visitors to watch, smell and even touch. The greenhouses in this case become the lung of the whole building, regulating the thermal environment and natural ventilation inside the building. The greenhouses are supported by wooden truss structure to correspond with the vegetation displaying inside and obtain proper lighting, forming a soft and easeful atmosphere.
South Aerial View from Model ( 1: 300 )
Green House
North Elevation View from Model ( 1: 300 )
Rotating Modules: Prefabricated Residential Tower for Migrant Workers
Nanjing, China
Bachelor 4, Fall 2021
Instructor: Bao Li
Sites
Nanjing has about 2 million migrant workers, most of whom are young people engaged in various industries. However, most of them do not own a fixed residence. For them, their most urgent need is to have a home in Nanjing, with decent environment and people in similar situations living around to associate with.
At the same time, in the process of urban renewal in Nanjing, there are many idle lands with different shape and area among the city texture. We aim to design a universal module to build residence towers for migrant workers on these lands. As the number of migrant workers increases rapidly year by year, the design adopt prefabricated steel structures, which can greatly reduce the time cost of construction, to meet the increasing needs.
Conceptual Street View Render
Conceptual Construction Render
4 Types of Layout
With the traffic cylinder as the center, the spaces of the tower rotate up floor by floor, so that the roof gardens can be connected with each other in a spiral way and have enough space height for vegetation growth, while ensuring the lighting of each house type and platform without affecting each other.
Due to the rotation of the module, the residents can enjoy not only the roof garden on their own floor, but also the view of other gardens on other floors at any time, even from their balconies or windows.
Balcony - Roof Garden
Layout Variation
Migrant workers have different requirements according to their conditions. Based on the basic module, multiple plans including single room, double room, couple room, shared rental room and family room are designed. These plans are flexibly combined to produce multiple combination plans to meet the diverse living needs.
In addition to the given plans, residents can also flexibly self-define the interior layout. Because of the external placement of the equipment pipe space, residents can even choose not to install the suspended ceiling.
