# The Last Land by Hans Schabus

Here is the project that Hans Schabus achieved for the Venice Art Biennale 2005: a monumental piece of rock in the middle of the Giardini. The inside part is as impressive as the outside with numerous wooden beams and posts maintaining the building's structural integrity.

# Tate Modern Unilever Series 2010 by Ai Wei Wei

The new installation in the Tate Modern's turbine hall in London for the now traditional Unilever Series has been created by the Chinese artist/architect Ai Wei Wei who populated the ground by 100 millions (!) hand made unique porcelains mimicking a sunflower seed.
Visitors are invited to set foot on this particle-landscapes and probably experience the change of the surface imposed by their body.

Tate Modern 12 October 2010 – 2 May 2011 (London)
photographs belong to the Tate Modern

# An Architecture "des humeurs" by R&Sie(n)

photograph by Matthieu Kavyrchine

I already published some information about R&Sie(n)'s exhibition An Architecture "des humeurs" but I thought it was definitely worth it to introduce less the exhibition in itself and more of the speculation as much as emphasizing the fact that R&Sie(n) is one of the extremely rare architectural offices who offer the totality of documents and information on their website.

As an introduction of Francois Roche's lecture at Columbia last week, Mark Wigley brilliantly elaborated on the fact that a lot of contemporary architects are self proclaimed "experimental", "provocative", "on the edge", "innovative"; however the proper of such characteristics is to disturb people by their novelty and few architectures can be defined as suchnowadays. Wigley then affirmed that Roche was one of those few who lead you in the uncomfortable zones of experimental architectures and narratives.

Only a little has been written about An Architecture "des humeurs", and a lot of us can see in this fact a proof that consensual architecture only is leading the current (non)-debate of ideas whereas true research is being underrated. One could possibly argue that this speculation remains too much on the surface, and that rather than dealing with a dozen of dimensions of the project, R&Sie(n) should have confront with the depth of only of them. Nevertheless, from his own words, Francois Roche prefers to "swim between the surface and the abysses, from speculation to fiction until the negotiation with ambiguous and contradictory forces of the here and now".

As a result, An Architecture "des humeurs" attempts -and often succeeds- to articulate all together neurosciences, robotic, politics, mathematics, engineering, biology, computation and philosophy. To do so, R&Sie(n) spent those two last years working with mathematicians, scientists, robotic designers, artists, philosophers and developed a debate of ideas (see previous article) at the same time than proposed its speculation.

The exhibition was first commissioned by Le Laboratoire in Paris and is currently moving between Basel and Graz.

The official website of An Architecture "des humeurs", as I wrote above is extremely rich and generous in information so I recommend to explore the following categorized links:

Links and Press articles

Synapses Speeches
-Event the 16th of February / Paris / Some transcripts included

Pictures
- Models
- Prototypes
- Exhibition

An architecture des humeurs
- Intro (English/Francais)

Credits

Physiomorphologies
– “Humeurs”
– Temperaments linked to the four “humeurs”
– Bio-chemistry
– Physiological interview through Nano-particles
– Data extracted from Ip(m) / Interview
– Set theory
– Mathematical inputs which affects the physio-morphologies
– Transactional relation operations
– Schemas and formulations
– Morphological definitions
– Morphological stratum
– From mathematical equations to computational procedures.
– Morphologies resultants

Multitude
- Assemblage
- Strategies of aggregation
- Morphologies
- Tribal arborescences

Mathematical operators for structural optimization
- Calculation parameters
- Inputs received via a text file of the morphology
- Forces and constraints taken as system inputs
- Shape optimization
- Protocols of tests
- Calculation on physio-morphologies
- Profile resultant

Alg(s)
- Global+local association

Robotic + Substances
- Robotic Movie
- From the “Algorithm(s)” to bio-knit physicality
- Morphologies-Weaving / Bondage

Bio-cement secretions/ extrusions
- Tooling / Weaving concrete bio-polymer (material expertise)
- Recipe of the bio-component
- Comparison concrete/bio-concrete
- Tests of secretion-weaving concrete bio-polymer
- Structural Computation of weaving
- Y Fragment

Machinisme
- Tooling / Robotic process
- Description
- Definition / Fluidic Muscle
- Research and Development

Script/Computation/Text-files
- Schemas
- Scripts

Other
- Affective Substances
- Natural machine

Credits
…
…
-R&Sie(n) / Le Laboratoire / 2010
-Scénario, design, production : R&Sie(n)

Associé à :
-François Jouve / Process mathématiques
-Winston Hampel, Natanel Elfassy / Computations (with some help of Marc Fornes)
-Stephan Henrich / Process et Design Robotique
-Gaëtan Robillard, Frédéric Mauclere, Jonathan Derrough / Design

et Process de captations physiologiques
-Berdaguer et Péjus / Scénario Nano-récepteurs
-Mark Kendall / Microneedles
-Delphine Chevrot / Takako Sato / “The Lift”
-Candice Poitrey / Interview Physiologique
&
-Chris Younes / Machine Naturelle
&
-Jiang Bin, architecte
-Laura Bellamy
-Rosalie Laurin

# UTOPIA TODAY : INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE 22 - 23 - 24 OCTOBER 2010

Following is the programme of an upcoming event I really invite you to join !
I'll be around for an installation, and I'll try to do a report for the unlucky ones that won't be able to come. See you there!

Utopia today?

Saline Royale Arc-et-senans, 22-24.10.2010

friday 22.10.2010

14:00 – 14:30 Andri Gerber, Brent Patterson (ESA Paris)

introduction

14:30 – 14:50 Michel Pierre, Director Saline Royale

welcome

14:50 – 15:00 Martial Marquet, Paris

Rise above

15:00 – 15:30 break

15:30 – 16:00 Ole W. Fischer (Harvard)

After Modernity – architecture between utopia, nostalgia and dirty reality?

Comments on the uncertain state of an ancient profession…

16:00 – 16:30 Michel Pregardien (Université de Liège)

Il n’y a plus de place pour l’utopie

16:30 – 17:00 break

17:00 – 18:00 David Harvey (New York)

18:00 – 19:00 round table discussion, moderators Odile Decq, Andri Gerber, Brent Patterson

19:00 – 20:30 dinner

20:30 movie projection

saturday 23.10.2010

8:00 – 9:00 breakfast

9:30 – 9:50 resumé Andri Gerber

9:50 – 10:30 Philippe Morel (EZCT, Paris)

10:30 – 11:10 Matthias Pauwels (BAVO, Rotterdam)

From urban laboratories to utopian NGOism. Recent mutations in architectural utopianism

11:10 – 11:30 break

11:30 – 12:00 Karin Bradley (The Royal Institute of Technology – KTH, Stockholm)

Freegans, squatters and urban farmers – Radical political ecology in the making

12:00 – 12:30 Katia Frey, Eliana Perrotti (ETH Zürich)

Women’s utopia. Tradition and future opportunities of a gender oriented town planning

12:30 – 14:00 lunch

14:00 – 14:30 Julia Ramírez Blanco (Complutense University of Madrid)

The ideal city of AVL-Ville

14:30 – 15:00 Hendrik Tieben (The Chinese University of Hong Kong)

Gordon Wu - Hong Kong’s empirical utopist

15:00 – 15:30 break

15:30 – 16:00 Stefan Kurath (Urbanplus, Zürich)

Imagine grison, the meaning of working with architectural utopies and dystopies in the daily practice

16:00 – 16:40 Peter Eisenman, interview by Emmanuel Petit (Yale University)

16:40 – 17:30 Winy Maas (MVRDV, Rotterdam)

What’s next?

17:30 – 18:00 break

18:00 – 19:00 roundtable, moderators Andri Gerber, Johannes

Käferstein, Brent Patterson

19:00 – 20:30 dinner

20:30 movie projection

sunday 24.10.2010

8:00 – 9:30 breakfast

9:30 – 9:50 resumé (Brent Patterson)

9:50 – 10:20 Jae Emerling / Ronna Gardner (University of North Carolina)

Prosthetic Architecture as Heterotopia

10:20 – 10:50 Hanspeter Bürgi (HSLU, Luzern)

Gross National Happiness: The Bhutanese concept and a focus on space, energy and culture

10:50 – 11:10 break

11:10 – 12:00 Final discussion with all speakers

12:00 – 13:30 lunch

# Miracle Boxes /// Exhibition on Le Corbusier at Pratt

Professor Ivan Shumkov and his crew of courageous Pratt students are opening this Monday at 6:00PM an exhibition on Le Corbusier's work entitled Miracle Boxes. Pratt being one school that claims itself as fully part of the avant garde, it is quite refreshing to see that this claim still allows an exhibition on one of the most important modernist architect.

Here is the text related to the exhibition and the associated lectures:

Pratt Institute School of Architecture and the Pratt Library will present "Le Corbusier - Miracle Boxes", a multidisciplinary, three-part exhibition on the work of renowned Swiss-French architect, urbanist, designer, writer, and painter Le Corbusier (born Charles-Édouard Jeanneret-Gris), who is considered by many to be the most important architect of the 20th century, starting August 30, 2010. "Miracle Boxes," the first New York exhibition dedicated entirely to the work of Le Corbusier, is curated by Ivan R. Shumkov, Ph.D., adjunct associate professor of architecture at Pratt Institute. Shumkov will deliver an opening lecture that will be followed by a reception on September 13, 2010 at 6 p.m in Higgins Hall Auditorium located at 61 St. James Place in Brooklyn. The exhibition, opening lecture, reception, and an upcoming related symposium will be free and open to the public.

On view through October 15, 2010 in the atrium and in The Hazel and Robert Siegel Gallery of Higgins Hall, the exhibition's architectural portion will provide an in-depth look at more than 50 of Le Corbusier's public buildings, including all his exhibition pavilions, museums, theaters, cultural centers, monuments, and temples. Original editions of such seminal works as Vers un Architecture, Precisions, Le Modulor, and Le Corbusier Oeuvre Complete will be on display in the Pratt Library through November 20, 2010. In addition, a timeline of the projects displayed in Higgins Hall will accompany the book display, providing exhibition attendees with a comprehensive view of Le Corbusier's work over time.

To give Pratt students, faculty, and visitors an opportunity to experience one of Le Corbusier's visions first-hand, the exhibition will also include the Miracle Box: a full-scale construction based on Le Corbusier's smallest architectural project, or a "working cell" that was originally located inside his Atelier in Paris. The exterior façades will feature a selection of the symbols published in Le Corbusier's books, which, while not part of the original design, further represent Le Corbusier's work. The project is currently on view outside the Pratt Library, and will be installed in the lobby of the Library as part of its permanent collection following the exhibition.

Pratt Institute School of Architecture will also host the symposium "Voyage through Le Corbusier" on Monday, October 11 from 6 to 9 p.m. in conjunction with the "Le Corbusier - Miracle Boxes" exhibition. It will include presentations by scholars Kenneth Frampton, Mary McLeod, Jose Oubrerie, Stanislaus von Moos, Deborah Gans, and Ivan Shumkov who will speak about their research on the work of Le Corbusier and his legacy - which goes far beyond the fields of architecture and art in suggesting a plan for radical social change. After the individual presentations, the symposium participants will gather for a round table discussion and public question-and-answer session.

For more information on the exhibition, lecture, and symposium surrounding "Le Corbusier- Miracle Boxes," please visit http://www.miracleboxes.com.

The exhibition and symposium are made possible in part with generous support from Elise Jaffe + Jeffrey Brown.

# Within Big Bambu at the Metropolitan Museum

Lots of things have been already posted online about the Metropolitan Museum's current terrace exhibition, Big Bambú by Starn Studio; nevertheless I decided to publish some of the photographs I took yesterday while visiting the exhibition. But, rather than attempting to explain the form of this installation (that you can probably find somewhere else), I preferred to insist on the complexity of the lines in order to lost the viewer.

One has to admit that Big Bambú is not as extreme than in its former version (see previous post) since the MET requested a horizontal platform for people to walk on (at least, those who survived from the pretty bad organization of the museum) which forced the installation to re-adopt a more traditional structure made of vertical and horizontal lines than the previous one.

Despite this fact, one can still imagine a giant bamboo forest populated by hundreds of Barons in the Trees moving from branch to branch without ever touching the ground again...

# French Architecture's elite has a new stupid idea

After the construction of the French Pavilion at Shanghai which has strictly nothing to say in architectural matters, here is the new proof of the little French architecture world's stupidity. They (La Cite de l'Architecture et du Patrimoine) found nothing more clever to be noticed than to plan to build a 10m tall tower made exclusively out of food in some kind of XVIIIth century nostalgia when it was pretty tasteful to play with food when most of the country was struggling to eat.
As Jerome Auzolle recalls in his letter to the Minister of Culture, currently in France, 750 000 people are obliged by their situation to survive thanks to the National Food Aid. This tower is thus a symbol of Sarkozy's France: a society where a majority struggle while a minority do not even understand what reality is made of. "If you don't have a rolex when you're fifty years old, you are a looser" said Jacques Seguela, advertiser and good friend of the President...this could be the slogan of the French government and elite...

If you want to sign the petition that attempts to avoid this food tower's construction you can follow this link (it's in French though)

# Numen's Tape Installations

Numen is a Vienna based office that created four different installations exclusively with tape. They appropriate a site, find some attachment nodes and create a penetrable cocoon for their visitors. Those Tape Installations have been produced for two different sites in Vienna, one in Belgrade, and recently one for Berlin's former airport Tempelhof.

# Playing the building by David Byrne

Playing the building is a 2005-09 project by Musician David Byrne who connected a piano to a series of devices that make the building around releasing a sound. The sounds can thus be combinated which ultimately creates a symphony that John Cage would have probably not deny.

Each visitor of the exhibition are encouraged to try this building instrument that develops a peculiar way of interacting with a building

Thanks Martin !

# Field Trips by Bernd & Hilla Becher and Robert Smithson

Field Trips is the name of a 2002 exhibition organized for the Museu de Arte Contemporanea de Serralves in Porto. It gathered the work of Bernd & Hilla Becher and Robert Smithson inspired by their visit to Oberhausen in the Ruhr (Germany) in 1968. The fantastic book of the same name offers beautiful photographs by the Bechers and documents (inventory, drawings, pictures etc.) by Smithson, including his famous Asphalt Rundown (1969) that dramatized a stream of burning hot asphalt on the earth.