One of the biggest pieces of outsider art in New York City, the Broken Angel, is confronting the latest stage of its gradual decline, from a 10-story distorted jumble of wood and glass, to a now more subdued house that still retains the creative energy of its builder, Arthur Wood. Wood’s son Christopher recently launched a Kickstarter project, with supporters paying for their original art to adorn the facade, the ultimate goal being to turn the building into a museum. — blogs.artinfo.com
The project received approval from the Architectural Board of Review (ABR) last year, but this week, with the plan returning for final sign-off on some late-hour landscaping tweaks, the board majority, for what appeared to be political reasons stemming from the gay-marriage flap, opted to abstain from voting on Monday. — independent.com
Helene Schneider, the mayor of SB, and a proponent of marriage rights, says Chick-fil-A’s Architectural Approval Shouldn’t Hinge on Owner’s Politics. View full entry
That moment in modern guerilla urbanism [...], is one of the highlights of "Spontaneous Interventions: Design Actions for the Common Good," the American Pavilion's inherently political theme at this year's Venice Architecture Biennale. There will be no headlining starchitects or grandiose buildings. Instead, this year's pavilion presents this event and others like it, not as acts of whimsy, but rather as actions that address larger social issues. — artinfo.com
Click here to see more Archinect News posts related to the 13th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale. View full entry
When I was growing up, teenagers on the weekend would be on certain streetcorners selling maps to star’s homes. Yes, I lived amongst the myths. — Hildegarden’s Blog
An account in architecture and memory, Los Angeles artist Hildegarde Duane follows and records fourteen stations evoking memory cuts via buildings and the city, stitching the course of Marilyn Monroe. View full entry
If “action painting” is produced by the dynamics of dripping, smearing, and sweeping brushstrokes of paint to reveal the complex character of abstract art, then “action drawing” would be something like juxtaposing lines, planes, volumes, typographical elements, photographs, and paper... View full entry
London has its gracious Victorian mansions, New York has its elegant brownstones and Paris has its ornate Empire-style buildings. But what architectural legacy will future Abu Dhabi residents have to remind them of the city's early boom period?
The fear is that Abu Dhabi's headlong modernisation will eliminate all evidence of the city's evolution, leaving nothing significant to bridge the gap between the pre-oil age and the skyscraper city currently being built.
— thenational.ae
“Bat Cloud,” as her creation is called, is an unusual array of hanging bat houses installed at the refuge in May by the University at Buffalo architecture professor with the help of current and former students. — Buffalo News
The architects Peter Samton and Diana Goldstein can tell you exactly where they were a half century ago, at 5 p.m. on Aug. 2, 1962: out on Seventh Avenue, tilting at windmills.
Pennsylvania Station, the McKim, Mead & White masterpiece, was doomed. They knew it. But they weren’t going to let it go down undefended.
— cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com
Take Korea's Incheon International, for example. Built on top of a landfill 40 miles outside of Seoul, it features its own skating rink, cultural museum, and an assortment of other lavish amenities — all worthy investments for an airport that transported 34 million passengers and 2.5 million tons of cargo last year. — artinfo.com
Alison Klayman gained unprecedented access to the charismatic artist, as well as his family and others close to him, while working as a journalist in Beijing. In the years she filmed, government authorities shut down Ai's blog, beat him up, bulldozed his newly built studio, and held him in secret detention--while Time Magazine named him a runner-up for 2011's Person of the Year... Klayman's compelling documentary portrait is the inside story of a passionate dissident for the digital age... — youtube.com
The Hong Kong Institute of Architects and Hong Kong Arts Development Council will participate in the 13th International Architecture Exhibition of la Biennale di Venezia with an exhibition focusing on the vital urban, architectural and cultural regeneration of Kowloon East, Hong Kong SAR. The exhibition is titled “Inter Cities / Intra Cities: Ghostwriting the Future”. — bustler.net
Click here to see more Archinect News posts related to the 13th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale. View full entry
Mr. Pichler was a sculptor and illustrator whose ... architectural drawings were not just plans; they were also works of art in and of themselves. Other images — “dream drawings,” as he called them — were dark and psychologically loaded. His figures were often skeletal or robotic. — New York Times
The Sound of Buildings is an audio exploration of Melbourne’s most architecturally significant buildings. Available free as an interactive iPhone and iPad app, The Sound of Buildings provides listeners with a deeper level of understanding and context for the selected buildings, as well highlighting Melbourne’s diverse architecture and urban spaces through an exploration of cultural, monuments, government, residential, commercial, transport, education, health and sporting projects. — soundofbuildings.com
"Regional governments enjoy the possibility of spending and inaugurating public works but they don't run the political risk or cost of raising taxes. — BBC News
Pascale Harter visits Spain where regions are clamouring for money from central government - and one of the reasons for this is their lavish spending on white elephant building projects, such as the airport at Ciudad Real, south of Madrid. View full entry
Outside of Paris lies a “Truman Show like über-replica of a French village from the last century, which seems to have sprung up overnight.” — fastcodesign.com