Below_ Free Foam Home by Andrés Jaque Right_ Christian Kerez’s structural models
engages with the building as a found-space – like a number of the other smaller exhibits, such as Amateur Architecture Studio’s timber-and-hook dome, which rises like a soufflé around the cramped terminal room’s compressed columns. There were two major screen-based exhibits. Wim Wenders’ 3D video If Buildings Could Talk celebrated SANAA’s Rolex Learning Centre. Though hard to take entirely seriously (with its slightly sententious voiceovers and catchy little score), it seductively sold the architectural project with cinematic sweeps of the sloping interior landscape, wonderful variations in light and shade, and the building’s uncompromising, unbelievable whiteness. Elsewhere Hans Ulrich Obrist’s individual interviews
with this year’s Biennale participants are relayed on little televisions. On one wall are printed 850 names of the luminaries he’s interviewed over the past two decades but, like a war memorial of those lost, the extensive listing leaves a daunting impression: would it have been too journalistic to pick out some quotes from the current interviews, for those without the time or inclination to sit through them all? Over at the Giardini, the Palazzo’s gallery space is more traditional though labyrinthine in layout. At the back of the building, OMA’s exhibition on preservation drew visitors through the maze of curiosities. Though this venue’s work was mostly smaller, it was no less communicative. Alongside an impressive array of conventional
models, architecture was represented in numerous inventive ways. Among other examples, the colour, intensity and depth of Andrés Jaque’s Fray Foam Home was delightful to behold (though how it represents a house escapes me still); and Do ho Suh + Suh Architects’ suspended replica of a New York domestic facade stitched together from diaphanous blue fabric is exquisite. There is much to inspire here.
The ‘people’ aspect of Sejima’s theme of ‘people meet in architecture’ is fairly difficult to discern in the resulting
The Architectural Review / October 2010 / Marginalia 091
exhibition, but the ‘architecture’ is certainly more pronounced than her predecessor’s efforts – though in a subtle, almost elusive way. It is an architecture that isn’t necessarily about building, but about the perception of spatial conditions. An exciting, energetic show, serious yet fun, it speaks to all the senses. Milton, I think, would be impressed. Will Hunter
SERGIO PIRRONE
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