CONTINUITY IN ARCHITECTURE

Immagini e memoria: Rome in the photographs of Father Peter Paul Mackey 1890-01

Sir John Soane’s Museum is hosting an exhibition from the photographic archive of the British School at Rome of the work of Fr. Peter Paul Mackey O.P., which presents a record of thecity undergoing rapid modernisation at the end of the nineteenth century. The expansion of the city and its new infrastructure horrified romantic artists in pursuit of a very late Grand Tour, but yielded vast amounts of new material for increasingly professionalised archaeologists. The tension between these two worlds, the simultaneous need to record and the desire to compose, are evident in many of the photographs, the ancient monuments seen against modern factories and before the maturing of present-day urban planting.

In his excellent catalogue essay Dr. Robert Coates-Stephens (Cary Fellow at the BSR) places the Dominican scholar Mackey’s images in their historical context of ‘Roma Capitale’, and the social context of the expatriate community of clerics, archaeologists and aesthetes, a society in which the word amateur still had its original meaning. The atmospherically staged exhibition continues at the Soane Museum until 12 September.

At present CiA staffer Eamonn Canniffe is researching a similar complementary collection of material, that of Captain J. Douglas Kennedy, held at the John Rylands Library in Manchester. The collection presents a haphazard but enthusiastic account of the same dilettante milieu.

The 6th Modern Interiors Research Centre Conference was held at Kingston University last week. The focus was upon histories and heritage.

Among the interesting collection of papers was a description of the reconstruction of the Hotel de Ville in Paris. The speaker defined the difference between renovation and reconstruction as the same as that between a painting and it’s copy. This was followed by a detailed discussion of George III’s bed. Other topics included a description of the changes to Glasgow School of Art and the evolution of the Church of St Michael’s in Cropthorne, Wiltshire. Sally Stone, with her co-author, Graeme Brooker presented a paper that discussed the remodelling of contaminated buildings.

Fred Scott, the eminent interiors theorist presented the final keynote address, “The room, its demise and possible resurrection”. This was based upon research that he’d conducted with Robin Evans and it discussed how in the 18C, the interior and the exterior of a building could exist independently. Modernism, and with it the pursuit of transparency, has lead to this difference has becoming unobtainable: “The room has been evicted from the house”.

Artex supplied the pink champagne

The last time Eamonn Canniffe (of CiA) was at Harvard, Peter Eisenman was a spring chicken. You can hear Eamonn speak about his current book at the De Bosis Colloquium in Italian Studies at the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures on 1st April. Details:

DeBOSIS COLLOQUIUM IN ITALIAN STUDIES 2009 (Italian 201)
EAMONN CANNIFFE
Manchester School of Architecture
The Politics of the Piazza. The History and Meaning of the Italian Square (Ashgate, 2008)
Respondent: DANIELE TURELLO

Wednesday, APRIL 1, 2009 from 4:00 to 6:00 PM Sever Hall, Room 203

Eamonn Canniffe has been invited to present his recent book “The Politics of the Piazza” at the prestigious De Bosis Colloquium in Italian Studies at Harvard University Department of Romance Languages and Literatures during the Spring Semester 2009.

The Politics of the Piazza: Look inside

Summer 1983: A restaurant in the North End of Boston with students from Harvard University Graduate School of Design.

Where are they now?

Alexis of Hot Chip at the Le Corbusier exhibition, Liverpool (25 October 2008)

Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen at the Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester to open the Flights of Fancy exhibition decrying minimalism and other “delusions of blandeur” and pleased to be in the “bosomy clinch of floral and flock wallpaper” (7 November 2008)

I’m a Mac. I’m a PC. Eisenman and Jencks discuss Powerpoint problems at the RIBA Annual Discourse, Liverpool (10 November 2008)

In what can only be described as an architectural celebrity bumper period for the northwest, we have been honoured by a number of distinguished guests.

Peter Eisenman delivered the RIBA Annual Discourse 2008 at the John Moores University. His lecture entitled: “Textual Heresies: Le Corbusier and the Palais des Congrès-Strasbourg, 1962 to 1964″ was an extremely thorough discussion of the building. He also examined the relationship between available technologies and architectural design, not just technology in the construction industry, but also that, which is available in the architects studio. He commented that computers do tend to become the design drivers, complaining that: “Student work all looks the same to me, that’s why I teach Palladio, I don’t know what else to teach”. Apparently the student retort to this one is “Drawin’ Palladio poché aint gonna get me a job in Frank Gehry’s office”.

Charles Jencks introduced Peter Eisenman, describing him as “A conscience for architecture”…and… “A thorn in the side of cliché”. I think that we can all agree with that.

Revisiting Roma Interrotta.

(Standard CiA camera salute - Ed.)

OK, the main event is obviously the opening of the Corb exhibition in Lutyens’ crypt (the subtitle ‘The Art of Architecture’ doesn’t inspire) but Peter Eisenman has got to be worth a trip.

Peter Eisenman: Architecture and the Cultural Project

Le Corbusier and Britain: Adrian Forty, Irena Murray, Alan Powers

Le Corbusier and India: Balkrishna Doshi

Le Corbusier ‘Le Grand’ - Tim Benton

The vast exhibition of contemporary architecture which is the Venice Biennale (curated by Aaron Betsky) opened last weekend in a stormy atmosphere which made the exhibitions oases of rather damp calm, despite the unsettling, luxurious aspirations of some of the exhibitors. How nature, not to mention the current economic storms, intrudes on the best laid plans! The utopian visions of the digital future and interactive environments with new fluid forms are presented in a stunning display at the Arsenale. Marked by a particularly stimulating entrance area (Rockwell Group with Jones/Kroloff) that sets a high standard which the subsequent sequence of displays extend in a series of varied rooms. Much of this material is not new (either in ideas or forms), but is presented here as a spatial experience which tantalises the visitor with possible worlds. The indulgence of the creators in focusing on their own concerns betrays the self-referential interest of much of this work. The MVRDV/Philippe Rahm section for example, with its futuristic urban animation, relaxing naked people and musician improvising on a saw suggests nothing more than the continuing polarity between attention seeking techno-geekiness and a late revival of hippiedom, ideas first synthesised forty years ago by Superstudio.

The displays have a strongly historicist feel, with some of the original characters, represented especially by Coop Himmelblau, expanding on their ideas for interactive autonomous environments. The Roma Interrotta exhibition of 1978 is revived as an antechamber to a display of contemporary ideas for Rome, Uneternal City, which takes the earlier urban speculation forward. The other developments of that era are acknowledged in the Italian Pavilion at the Giardini with exhibitions of Madelon Vriesendorp’s provocative images for OMA, Zaha Hadid’s early models and paintings and various works from the office archive of Frank Gehry. The form-laden nature of this work sits somewhat uncomfortably with a series of displays which deal with the social and ecological aspects of contemporary concern, but then in totality the exhibition seems to tip the hat quite frequently to once-were-deconstructivists, as if in memory of Betsky’s own involvement in defining that movement.

The British Pavilion presents a series of housing projects, solid buildings ill-served by the the witlessness of the display. dRMM’s work in particular suffers from the miserable position their models occupy. Contrast this unappealing tightness with the engaging generosity of the French Pavilion, which has pivoting models encouraging engagement from the exhibition visitors, and the German Pavilion’s reassuringly ‘chaotic’ ecological display.

The real surprises within the many varied displays are perhaps best summarised by the Mexican contribution at the Arsenale which provides some welcome social content in distinction to the overwhelmingly form driven displays there. At the Giardini the USA Pavilion provides a cooler response to similar issues, a development which can only be welcomed.

As always the Nordic Pavilion hovers elegantly at the centre of the Giardini. This year it presents a monographic exhibition on the work of the pavilion’s architect Sverre Fehn which in its tranquil confidence provides reassurance that all novelties in architecture eventually pass away…

Following the post by Aventinus below more writers express their scepticism about the qualities of the Smithsons’ Robin Hood Gardens: Part iv and Fantastic Journal and Neighbourhoods.

Building Design are pushing 1000 names. Were you emboldened?

In the years since our first visit to their Hotel-Restaurant the Steiner Family have, every Christmas, sent us a sprig of vegetation from the forest surrounding their building, better known to architects as the Khuner House by Adolf Loos. Guests can stay, relax and eat in the almost unaltered environment of the house, a place which brings out the architect’s concern for homeliness, comfort and contextual materials (it is made of logs). The food is exceptional and the view is magnificent.

Happy Christmas.

Alpenhof Kreuzberg