TRANSLATIONS
deadline full paper
April 15, 2026
conference registration
May 15 – June 30, 2026
TOPICS
- 1. FROM LITERARY TO PHYSICAL EXPERIENCE: Drawing as an Act of Translation
- 2. FROM LANGUAGE TO DIGITAL SPACE: Technological Translations
- 3. MAKING IS THINKING: Translating Thought into Space
KEYWORDS
drawing literature language architecture psychology neuroscience emotions
visualization education well-being design social sciences AI
2026 EDITION
IDEA 2026 explores space and perception through the concept of translation, understood as the process through which thought becomes language, language becomes representation, and representation becomes spatial and perceptual experience.
Ideas, memories, and emotions are first translated into words or graphic signs; these, in turn, are translated into designed spaces and lived environments, shaping human perception and emotional response. Drawing, writing, modeling, and technological representation are therefore not neutral tools, but active cognitive and perceptual operations that mediate between mind, body, and space.
Representation acts here as a threshold between perception and construction, mediating between narrative imagination and spatial reality.
The congress invites contributions that investigate translation as a core mechanism in the construction of space and experience, opening interdisciplinary perspectives across architecture, design, humanities, technology, and cognitive sciences.
TOPICS
1. FROM LITERARY TO PHYSICAL EXPERIENCE: Drawing as an Act of Translation
This topic focuses on the translation between literary space and spatial representation. Written descriptions, narratives, and textual imaginaries are translated into graphic signs — drawings, diagrams, maps — or, conversely, visual representations are translated into narratives.
Drawing is understood here as an interpretative and generative act, capable of transforming literary space into spatial form and experiential meaning; as a universal medium for narrating powerful stories, capable of engaging the public in a direct and affective way, across disciplines and cultural contexts.
Narrated space — whether written or drawn — activates embodied perceptual mechanisms, engaging imagination and affect even in the absence of physical presence. In this perspective, representation is not a secondary transcription of space, but a generative act through which space is constructed, interpreted, and emotionally experienced.
Contributions may address architectural design, historical analysis, and theoretical reflections and experimental practices in which representation operates as a translation between written language, graphic sign, and physical space.
2. FROM LANGUAGE TO DIGITAL SPACE: Technological Translations
The second topic investigates translation processes mediated by technology. Prompts, algorithms, digital models, simulations, and immersive environments translate language, data, and conceptual intentions into visual, spatial, and multisensory experiences — and vice versa.
Technology is considered not merely as a tool for visualization, but as a cognitive interface that reshapes how space is conceived, represented, and perceived.
Contributions may explore AI-driven design processes, 3D environments, virtual and augmented reality, and experimental representational methods as contemporary forms of spatial translation.
3. MAKING IS THINKING: Translating Thought into Space
The third topic addresses the relationship between making, thinking, and perceiving. The act of designing, drawing, or constructing is understood as a form of embodied cognition, in which thought is translated into space and space, in turn, generates perceptual and emotional experience.
From architectural design to experimental practices, this topic invites a reconsideration of the project as an embodied practice, in which knowledge emerges through the interaction between mind, hand, and environment. Spatial configurations are explored in relation to psycho-physical well-being, highlighting how design actively shapes perception, emotion, and bodily experience.
Contributions may explore how spatial making influences perception, emotion, and psycho-physical responses, bridging architectural and design practices with neuroscience, psychology, and biomedical research. .
idea conference 