Archinect - News

Editor's Picks #316

2013-05-22T11:11:00-04:00

Beth Mosenthal penned a thoughtful Op-Ed titled The Ego and the Architect. Therein, she briefly examined "the idea of ‘leadership’ in an architectural office".

News
Celebrating the fact that "the Museum of Modern Art blinked" Michael Kimmelman wrote an article Defending the Former American Folk Art Museum Building. Donna Sink commented "A lovely, calm argument and well- written article. Fingers crossed that MOMA's less egotisticsl and more community-focused board members will listen".

Archinect talked to Ivan Blanco, designer of the competition-winning entry in the LA Film Festival Director's Lounge Design Competition. Ivan heads LA-based multi-disciplinary design studio Blnko Design Labs. Eric Chavkin enjoyed the interview but had a couple of thoughts "The scheme is, well, kind of typical but does address the very important IMHO the after film-aspect of going to a screening. The 'windows frame' metaphor is just weak".

Following the release of CLOG: Brutalism—the NYC-...

Gowanus by Design: WATER_WORKS Competition Exhibit Opens Tomorrow

2013-05-21T14:37:00-04:00

Back in February, we had published the winners of Gowanus by Design's second design and planning competition, WATER_WORKS. The intent of the competition, according to David Briggs, co-founder of Gowanus by Design, was to design a new community resource in Douglass/Greene Park that shares the site with a Combined Sewer Overflow [CSO] retention facility.

The award winners, along with other entries selected by the GbD competition committee, will be on display tomorrow, Wednesday, May 22, at the Old American Can Factory Gallery, 232 Third Street at Third Avenue in Brooklyn, NY. The event starts at 6:30PM.

Previously: Gowanus by Design: WATER_WORKS Competition Winners

Coming this June: James Turrell Reimagines FLW’s Guggenheim Rotunda

2013-05-20T17:45:00-04:00

In his first solo exhibition in a New York museum since 1980, American artist James Turrell sets out to reimagine the iconic rotunda of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Guggenheim Museum in a dramatic transformation. The luminous and immersive site-specific work, Aten Reign, will be part of the upcoming exhibition James Turrell at NYC's Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum which opens on June 21, 2013.

Win a FREE Full Pass to the 2013 AIA National Convention from reThink Wood

2013-05-20T11:47:00-04:00

reThink Wood Wants to get you into the 2013 AIA National Convention in Denver for FREE!
reThink Wood is offering a full pass to one lucky Archinect respondent!
http://www.aia.org/CONVENTION
Denver, CO | June 20-22

To enter the competition fill out this quick survey. A winner will be selected at random on June 6, 2013.

The AIA National Convention provides architects an opportunity to network, learn about growing trends and gain new resources, and reThink Wood’s attendance at the 2013 AIA National Convention offers just that. This June, reThink Wood will be on site at the AIA National Convention in Denver, Colorado providing education sessions on innovative wood design, resources for designing with wood and on-site advisors who can speak to the benefits of wood building systems and specific product applications.

In celebration of their attendance at the architectural event of the year, reThink Wood is offering a full pass to the AIA National Convention ($860 value) to one luc...

FRANK GEHRY AT WORK on View in New York City

2013-05-15T18:27:00-04:00

Gehry fans in NYC, here's one for you: A selection of over 30 Frank Gehry process models is currently on display at Manhattan's Leslie Feely Fine Art. The exhibition FRANK GEHRY AT WORK opened in April and still runs until June 29. The gallery is located at 33 E 68th Street, 5th Floor.

BRUTALISM + PRESERVATION panel discussion tonight in NYC

2013-05-15T12:09:00-04:00

Following the release of CLOG: Brutalism—the architecture journal's most recent issue—CLOG and DoCoMoMO NY Tristate are pleased to co-sponsor a panel discussion that will focus on the politics, opportunities, and constraints surrounding these structures. The conversation will address common issues faced by Brutalist buildings including their structural potential, aesthetics, and how these factors and more make the question of preserving Brutalist structures difficult and oftentimes contentious.

For those of you who heart brutalism, we still have some t-shirts left.

Oh, and CLOG is hiring, if you haven't heard.

The Roman Catholic Church is coming to the Venice Biennale

2013-05-14T20:44:00-04:00

The Vatican’s presence at the Biennale is the brainchild of Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, an exuberant polymath who as president of the Pontifical Council for Culture since 2009 has tried to build bridges between the church and contemporary culture, two worlds that have often clashed.

Charles Correa's influence and style

2013-05-14T10:17:00-04:00

His eye-catching buildings have helped define the architecture of post-independence India.

A new exhibition at the Royal Institute of British Architects in London - which has been gifted Correa's archive - celebrates his decades-long career. The BBC's took a look with the designer, fellow architect David Adjaye.

MoMA pulls back from original plan to destroy award-winning American Folk Art Museum building

2013-05-11T22:08:00-04:00

Thursday, MoMA director Glenn D. Lowry sent a memo to MoMA's trustees and staff announcing the museum had retained Diller Scofidio + Renfro to "work with us to design a plan that will integrate the Museum's current building with the property of the American Folk Art Museum. . . . We readily agreed to consider a range of options, and look forward to seeing their results."

A statement from Diller Scofidio + Renfro said the design firm would explore all possibilities, "which include, but are not limited to, integrating the former American Folk Art Museum building, designed by our friends and admired colleagues, Tod Williams and Billie Tsien."

"My sense is they will try to save at least some of it. I can't imagine good designers destroying a great building for no good reason," said Quilian Riano, acting professor of design at Parsons The New School.

Riano helped lead a digital battle to offer MoMA "alternative visions" to destroying the 12-year-old building that swept world arch...

Recap: The New Museum’s Ideas City Festival By William Hanley

2013-05-10T03:02:00-04:00

At the Ideas City street fair: An installation made from discarded styrofoam by Terreform ONE rises in front of Raumlabor's Spacebuster, a mobile inflatable pavilion comissioned by the Storefront for Art and Architecture.

2013 National Design Award Winner James Wines among speakers at Saturday 5/11 "WWW Drawing" symposium in NY

2013-05-09T18:30:00-04:00

The (de)vices and virtues of hand drawing versus digital drawing will be debated at "WWW Drawing: Architectural Drawing from Pencil to Pixel" at the Drawing Center, in SoHo New York, this Saturday May 11 from 2-4 pm — a symposium co-produced by Penn State University's Stuckeman School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, and the Drawing Center.

Speakers include renowned architects James Wines (just-announced 2013 National Design Award Winner for Lifetime Achievement, and President of SITE Architecture, Art & Design), Michael Webb (Archigram, Cooper Union), and Mark West (University of Manitoba) — the "Ws" of the project title — along with five rising stars of computational design, fine art, architecture and programming: Daniel Cardoso Llach, Andrew Heumann, Seher Shah, Ann Tarantino and Jürg Lehni.

A new documentary video of the March 2013 WWW Drawing Workshop at Penn State U will debut at the symposium, which will be co-moderated by Stuckeman School Head of Architectur...

Gaetano Pesce retrospective opens in NYC

2013-05-09T11:28:00-04:00

Pesce hasn’t had a comprehensive solo show in his adopted hometown since a 1999 exhibit tucked away at Columbia University’s School of Architecture. “He’s a legend and a New Yorker, so that tragedy needed to be corrected,” said Steven Learner, the creative director of the new Collective.1 Design Fair, where Pesce’s retrospective opened today.

For more information on the Collective .1 Design Fair, click here.

Archeology of the Digital

2013-05-08T12:41:00-04:00

Now is the time stop starting with "in the future" in relationship to digital technology. This show will tell, "in the past digital technology did this." It is time to write its history.

Greg Lynn aims to pull the curtain on the digital positioning of sci-fi and other camps and record the history of the subject for what it really is or was. This could help the recent debates of what is what, and, depending on the curation, place certain legacies in place.

Richard Meier Reflects on His Last 50 Years, With Retrospective Opening in Italy

2013-05-08T12:39:00-04:00

I’m very happy to see all the works on display, and we’re busier now than we were then. We’re looking at things that we’re doing in the future. I think it’s good to be able to share so much of the work we have done that people wouldn’t otherwise come in contact with it. The exhibitions are good in that respect. We have all this stuff. Why keep it in the office? Send it out.

Corrugated Cardboard Pavilion by Miguel Arraiz García / David Moreno Terrón

2013-05-07T16:49:00-04:00

We have received photos and a video of a pretty stunning temporary pavilion built with 3,000 corrugated hexagonal cardboard boxes for the annual “Fallas” festival in the Spanish city of Valencia. The pavilion design was a collaborative effort between Miguel Arraiz García of bipolaire arquitectos and David Moreno Terrón of Pink Intruder.

‘Architecture Whispers’ Brings Intimate Architectural Discourse to Paris

2013-05-06T18:32:00-04:00

Paris has a new monthly event highlight: Architecture Whispers, a series of intimate multidisciplinary and cross-cultural conversations between emerging, established and visionary international architects and their colleagues in other disciplines. They take place in the Silencio Club located at 142 Rue Montmartre, an exclusive venue for writers, directors and musicians, established by American filmmaker/visual artist/musician David Lynch.

Zimoun: 318 prepared dc-motors, cork balls, cardboard boxes 100x100x100cm

2013-05-06T14:17:00-04:00

If you're in Berlin this May, make sure to swing by the Opernwerkstätten Berlin: Swiss artist, Zimoun, known for his "architecturally-minded platforms of sound," exhibits 318 prepared dc-motors, cork balls, cardboard boxes 100x100x100cm, one of the artist's two current European exhibitions. The piece will be on view until May 24th.

Gehry pulls out of MOCA's 'A New Sculpturalism' exhibition

2013-05-03T16:11:00-04:00

Frank Gehry has pulled out of a major architecture exhibition set to open June 2 at the Museum of Contemporary Art, a move that could force the show to find a new venue or face the prospect of being canceled altogether. The exhibition... is an exploration of the last 25 years of Los Angeles architecture, with work by Gehry, Thom Mayne, Michael Maltzan, Barbara Bestor, Lorcan O'Herlihy and many younger architects.

Time has a Q&A with Maya Lin

2013-05-02T12:48:00-04:00

From the very first, the Vietnam Memorial, it was about being extremely site-specific and site-sensitive, creating something that merged with the land around it. But much more so in the last decade or two decades, my artwork has focused on making you aware of things in the natural world that we might not be aware of. What’s invisible we tend not to think about, so I’ve made sculptures that reveal the terrain below sea level.

MOCA architecture show, funded by Getty, could face cancellation

2013-05-02T12:46:00-04:00

The exhibition was planned as an exploration of the last 25 years of Los Angeles architecture, with work by Frank Gehry, Thom Mayne, Michael Maltzan, Barbara Bestor and many younger architects. It was funded in part by a Getty Foundation grant of $445,000. No other single show in the PSTP series received a grant as large, according to a Getty press release. A 272-page catalog, co-published by Rizzoli, is already complete.

Facing delays in finishing the installation of the show, the show will be canceled, or, at best, delayed.

Cooper Union Students React

2013-04-30T15:23:00-04:00

Students in the School Architecture, with support of Art and Engineering students respond to Cooper Union Board of Trustees failure to uphold the mission of their school through a collaborative intervention upon the School of Architecture Lobby, a white space famously designed by John Hejduk. The students pinned two written statements upon the walls after completion(below). Until the recently announced decision Copper Union was the only school of Art, Architecture, and Engineering in the country to offer full tuition scholarships to all admitted students, admittance based solely on merit.

Statement #1

This space, the third floor lobby of Cooper Union's Foundation Building, is a sacred space, the heart of the School of Architecture. This is our citadel, our platform to address the world. This lobby is a place where we engage in a dialogue of critique, debate, and the free exchange of ideas. The spirit of this space, a work forged from the toil of many great individuals, has...

Hitler's Words Into Stone. Can architecture itself be fascist?

2013-04-28T00:06:00-04:00

Rather elegant," intoned the white-haired figure at the podium. He was speaking of Adolf Hitler's Reich Chancellery, designed in 1938 by Albert Speer. Up next on the screen was the Nuremberg Party Rally Grounds where brown-shirted Nazis paraded en masse. "I think it is really great architecture," said the lecturer. "You take off the swastikas, and you can admire it without feeling guilty."

As you might expect, "Audience members shifted awkwardly in their seats, and a few walked out to protest the remarks by Léon Krier, opening a conference on Berlin at the Yale School of Architecture in February." Anyone manage to actually be there for this, or have any follow-up?

Davidson Rafailidis Wins 2013 IDEAS CITY StreetFest Competition

2013-04-25T14:46:00-04:00

The submission "MirrorMirror" by Buffalo-based architecture practice Davidson Rafailidis has been selected by Storefront for Art and Architecture and the New Museum as the winning entry of the 2013 IDEAS CITY StreetFest Tenting Competition.

IABR 2014 Urban By Nature: Call for Projects

2013-04-24T12:33:00-04:00

The sixth edition of the International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam, IABR–2014–URBAN BY NATURE–, opens in May 2014 in the Kunsthal in Rotterdam. The Dutch landscape architect Dirk Sijmons is the curator and the theme is Urban by Nature.

The IABR calls for best practices from all over the world to support and substantiate the Biennale’s main exhibition’s narrative. Prospective participants who have designed or are designing concrete projects that deal with the relationship between man, nature and city, are invited to respond to the IABR–2014– Call for Projects–, and submit their applications by June 9, 2013.

Apply Here

Previously on Archinect:

Archinect Interviews George Brugmans, IABR - Part 1, Making City

Archinect Interviews George Brugmans, IABR - Part 2, Arnavutköy, Istanbul

Archinect Interviews George Brugmans, IABR - Part 3, São Paulo, Rotterdam and Beyond

Crusade commenced to convince MoMA not to demolish American Folk Art Museum

2013-04-18T14:26:00-04:00

Can it be saved? A grassroots crusade to persuade MoMA not to tear down the architecturally significant 12-year-old American Folk Art Museum at 45 W. 53rd St. has erupted, igniting the passion of architects, designers, preservationists and ordinary citizens.

Architects Dream up Alternatives to MoMA’s Tear Down Plan

2013-04-18T14:24:00-04:00

Architects and designers, responding to the news that the Museum of Modern Art intends to demolish a former museum, have some ideas for MoMA.Their concepts, some earnest and others tongue-in-cheek, are being compiled on a tumblr called #FolkMoMA, created to challenge MoMA’s assertion that the former American Folk Art Museum building is not compatible with its expansion plans.

Design Community Responds to Museum of Modern Art Decision on Folk Art Museum

2013-04-18T14:23:00-04:00

Almost as soon as the news broke last week that the Museum of Modern Art planned to demolish the former American Folk Art Museum, a movement emerged to save it. Members of the design community—including the architects who designed the building—are registering their discontent with the decision. More than one petition is now circulating to rescue the Folk Art building as a result.

Campaign to Crowdsource Ideas for Saving American Folk Art Museum Building

2013-04-18T14:21:00-04:00

When news broke this week that the Museum of Modern Art in New York intends on demolishing the former American Folk Art Museum building next door, a cry went up in the architectural and preservationist community. Now, a group of advocates is not only collecting protests to save the building, but also crowdsourcing design ideas for integrating the two adjacent museum structures. Using the hashtag #FolkMoMA, those concerned with the demolition can submit proposals via social media — Twitter, Flickr, Instagram, the usual suspects — with the best to go up on the effort’s Tumblr page.

What Should MoMA Do With the American Folk Art Museum?

2013-04-18T14:18:00-04:00

Do we save the American Folk Art Museum? As an architecturally significant monument, I believe MoMA should rethink its decision to raze the structure completely. If museums aren’t interested in saving the aesthetic heritage of our city, then we should be concerned about their role in our culture.

DawnTown Design/Build Competition Winner on View in Miami

2013-04-15T19:44:00-04:00

If you're in Miami these days, make sure to visit the exhibit of Up-Downtown, the winning entry of DawnTown’s inaugural Design/Build competition [...]. Up-Downtown, the successful collaboration between Jacob Brillhart (Miami, FL) and Manuel Clavel-Rojo (Murcia, Spain), interactively presents the rapid rise of downtown Miami over an extended period of time.