Friday, June 18, 2010

Conversations: Continued / PRAXIS + PS1 MoMA Symposium

Conversations: Continued / PRAXIS + PS1 MoMA Symposium: "


The symposium marks the release of the 11 Architects + 12 Conversations issue of PRAXIS: a journal of writing and building. The moderated discussion will invite audience participation in an open dialogue that explores shared and contested territory among this emerging generation of practices.

The symposium, “Conversations: Continued”, brings together 10 Young Architectural Practices: MOS, NArchitects, WORKac, PATTERNS, Aranda/Lasch, Productora, FAR, Ciro Najle, The Living, and Howeler +Yoon with two critics, Timothy Hyde and Lucia Allais. The event continues the more formal discussion begun in PRAXIS 11, 11 Architects/12 Conversations, by bringing the firms together in a shared conversation, broadening the issues at stake, and sharing the material with a wider architectural and public audience.

The symposium will take place next Friday, June 25, from 12:30 till 6 pm at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center in Queens. For further information and schedule, go to http://www.praxisjournal.net/home.htm.


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Monday, June 14, 2010

Ephemicropolis - A city scape all stapled

Ephemicropolis - A city scape all stapled: "THe city scape of Ephemicropolis was an installation y the artist Peter Root made from around 100'000 staples. The installation shown here took about 40 hours to set up, see 'the making of' below. Root graduated from the Fine Art BA Hons at University College Falmouth in 2000. Its amazing how this models the way we perceive the city and the building structure as a sort of abstraction. From the stationary cupboard to the Streets of the world.


Ephemicropolis by Peter Root

Image by Peter Root / Detail Ephemicropolis.





Found via
Urban Tick

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Why there's no art without architecture | Jonathan Jones

Why there's no art without architecture | Jonathan Jones: "
Contemporary visual art amounts to little without the architecture that surrounds it. Maybe we art critics have been looking at the wrong stuff
Is there any difference between art and architecture? I'm wondering this after writing a feature that was as much about architecture as 'art' – and in envy of architectural critics off to Rome to see Zaha Hadid's latest wonder, the Maxxi. It is impossible to conceive of the history of art in exclusion from that of architecture. If you were writing about the Baroque style, or the Arts and Crafts movement, or any other major cultural era: just to write about paintings and sculpture and ignore the buildings they were created for would be to trivialise the subject. It's the same today.
What will future cultural historians say about the arts in our time? They will almost certainly see architecture as the backbone of visual culture in the early 2000s. A brilliant moment in museum architecture (they will write), from Frank Gehry's Guggenheim to Zaha Hadid's Roman gallery, was a significant event in early 21st-century art. Visiting a museum became an enjoyment of grand space, a cubist exploration of architectural complexity.
It might have been a great moment in serious visual culture – but it was one that produced few artistic masterpieces in the conventional sense. The best art – from Martin Creed's The Lights Going On and Off to Richard Wright's elusive wall paintings – simply and eloquently comment on the architecture it graces.
Just as 17th-century Baroque paintings are most moving in the context of the architectural and decorative ensembles of southern Italian churches, so the cultural historians of tomorrow will see the art of our day as inseparable from its settings. Art critics might look a bit silly, always reviewing 'art' in an age when visual art is so architectural. Art may not be where art is at. All too often, we are reviewing the carpets, and saying nothing about the construction of the house.

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Tales of the City – Tagging Shoreditch and Beyond

Tales of the City – Tagging Shoreditch and Beyond: "Via the project talesofthings.com we have been capturing people’s memories of objects and playing them back via small readable and writeable QR codes and RFID tags. As part of the London Festival of Architecture 2010, Tales of the City extends the concept into the urban realm with the architecture of the city able to replay memories and its history.




The project will enable participants to add their own tales to buildings and view stories that other people have left. The project has been tagging architecture since its launch in April 2010, most notably Broadcasting House in Portland Place and a wall in Chalk Farm which when scanned replays how the wall used to look with a Banksy Stencil in place.

Tales of the City starts off with a pre-placed tag at the historic heart of Shoreditch, St Leonard's Church. From there you will be able to spot tags (QR codes) on Shoreditch High Street which you can add your own stories to, contributing to the growing network of tagged architecture.

This will enable people to form a personalised tour of London’s contemporary history through architecture. If you have an iPhone or an Android handset be sure to download our free app - talesofthings to enable you to leave comments on the QR codes, or create your own codes to put on your favourite buildings.

You can become a follower of the project over at the London Festival of Architecture page.

We will have more on Tales of the City next week...





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Tuesday, June 8, 2010

The Archigram Archival Project

The Archigram Archival Project: "




The Archigram Archival Project makes the work of the seminal architectural group Archigram available free online for public viewing and academic study. The project was run by EXP, an architectural research group at the University of Westminster. Archigram Began Life as a Magazine produced at home by the members of the group, showing experimental work to a growing, global audience. Nine (and a half) seminal, individually designed, hugely influential, and now very rare magazines were produced between 1961 and 1974. The last ‘half’ was an update on the group’s office work rather than a ‘full’ Archigram magazine. The Six Members of Archigram are Peter Cook, David Greene, Mike Webb, Ron Herron, Warren Chalk and Dennis Crompton. Cook, Greene and Webb met in 1961, collaborated on the first Archigram magazine, later inviting Herron, Chalk and Crompton to join them, and the magazine name stuck to them as a group.



More Than 200 Projects are included in the Archigram Archival Project. The AAP uses the group’s mainly chronological numbering system and includes everything given an Archigram project number. This comprises projects done by members before they met, the Archigram magazines (grouped together at no. 100), the projects done by Archigram as a group between 1961 and 1974, and some later projects.










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Common Boston Common Build Competition

Common Boston Common Build Competition: "


The Common Boston Common Build (CBCB) is a design competition that challenges participants to design and implement a project in response to real community needs. Held over 3 days during the Common Boston Community and Architecture Festival, the CBCB is open to teams and individuals from ALL disciplines and experience levels. Common Boston and LostInBoston have partnered to host this year’s event, focused to raise awareness of the built environment, improve wayfinding and inspire connections across Boston’s urban fabric.

Competitors will be asked to work with preselected sites as well as vocal neighborhood members to develop design solutions that address the specific physical and social needs of that community. The CBCB aims to prove that even when created in less than 3 days and with a capped budget, an innovative and influential response to a real problem can alter the way we interact with and understand the built environment of a community while seeking tangible benefits for its inhabitants.

For more information, go to the competition’s official website.
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