Architect Peter Zellner of ZELLNERandCompany (formerly known as Zellner Naecker Architects) is launching a new, tuition-free post-graduate school of architecture dubbed, appropriately, the Free School of Architecture (FSA). Slated to launch in 2017, the FSA hopes to become a laboratory for new thinking about architecture and how it's taught.
While a major part of the motivation for starting the school is to explore where “architecture education might go” without massive financial burdens for students and academic pressures for professors, the FSA also aims to “absolve both students and teachers of conforming to established models of thinking,” Zellner tells Archinect.
“One might think of FSA as providing an extracurricular or alternative education, less a traditional education,” Zellner states. “The end goal is to promote new ways of thinking architecture, not to rubber-stamp more academic and/or professional worker bees.”
The FSA is not yet accredited — Zellner expresses wariness about the accreditation process in general — and will likely be a nomadic, post-studio school without a campus. “I'm looking for some ‘non-denominational’ host spaces right now but basically the school will consist of about 15 chairs, a projector, maybe a chalkboard and some refreshments,” says Zellner. “It may never need much more than that.” The school will seek 501c3 status and a fiscal sponsor before classes start next yet.
In total, the first class will comprise 12 post-graduate students and 10 professors. By 2019, FSA is hoping to accept up to 36 students and cap out at 48 students by 2020. Interested students will be asked to write an 800 word personal essay that will be reviewed by a committee composed mainly of members of the FSA Board of Advisors, which is still in formation. Students will not be graded nor produce designs or written work.
The curriculum will be divided into five course bundles: architectural history and theory; design and aesthetic theory; practical and vocational topics; philosophy; and general studies. Zellner hopes that, while these groupings may seem “fairly traditional or generic”, the professors will expand these topics to encompass broader concerns, such as the socio-economics of education, diversity, and political outreach.
“My hope is that students and teachers alike will be curious, critical, ambitious and open to debate and intensive inquiry,” says Zellner. “Given the absence of fees or salaries I also hope the first FSA class and faculty will be [able to] create [a] diverse community. It goes without saying that architecture and architectural education are still dominated by the same old patriarchal monocultures.”
His experiment in pedagogy draws on precedents like Alvin Boyarsky’s leadership of the AA, Ray Kappe at SCI-Arc, and Peter Eisenman at the IAUS. “Sometimes you need to go backwards to go forwards if the present moment seems pretty much stuck in neutral,” Zellner explicates.
More information on the school and the professors will be released this winter with the call for applicants.
17 Comments
Interesting spin on the expert/ on-demand/ certificate-based training in architecture, but even more "interesting" that it relies upon students that already have degree in architecture to maintain it's credibility/relevance. And W/o offering a fancy certificate (eg. a degree), they run the risk turning into a salon, especially given that they seemingly are concerned just about ideas. And it seems to me that it is not "free," but available now that you paid perviously to do the heavy lifting.
I wouldn't be surprised if this turned into an organized intellectual dating site to match selected students and people looking to fill chairs.
damn. marc.
Just sayin...
Your take?
not disagreeing and this is quotable
I wouldn't be surprised if this turned into an organized intellectual dating site to match selected students and people looking to fill chairs.
My work is done...
+++Marc
Yeah, Marc. Brutal, but you're probably not wrong. Though, in many ways architectural education resembles The Salon, visionary/paper architecture has a long tradition. Dialogues between architects and their clients are becoming increasingly necessary if the potential economic and cinematic influence of architecture is going to continue to grow. For one: the architect who functions as 'auteur' may, if allowed, devise a better/more intentional approach to aspects of how architecture affects its occupants' & client's everyday life.
> they run the risk turning into a salon, especially given that they seemingly are concerned just about ideas.
You say that like it's a bad thing...
Having seen Zellner in action both in practice and education, I have trouble seeing this succeed as more than a tool for self-promotion. In our field, that's frequently enough, but I hope that once the pedagogical mission gets articulated there is actually something useful there. The recent and debate between Zellner and Gannon in the architects newspaper showed a big part of what is wrong with pedigreed architectural education in this country - both of them presented detailed, impassioned arguments about points wholly irrelevant to anything about the architecture that actual people actually build and inhabit.
Unfortunate abbreviation?
wadeandrewdrake agreed. Salons have been in architecture for a long time. Archinect in some respects (but not all threads) is the next iteration of that forum for discussion. But (Mission St.) I don't agree with it being just a salon and being called a school of architecture. And when it becomes a forum that is solely about ideas divorced from the built environment- by that I mean completely- it stops being a forum about architecture and becomes something else. But it's not a school of architecture.
the abbrevation comment is purely about branding, the actual idea sounds interesting.
whats the tuition like? federal aid?
^ Sort of, Olaf. But specifically the aid is from the Federation of Planets.
lmao l. yeah fuck this
just a quick question.
How can you be a part of this as a student and teacher both?
Plus is it for the world or just the USA?
Peace out :)
Sign me up. I'm all for it. teaching, learning, inspiring and being inspired. That sounds like a great place to be.
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