![]()
Did someone say...get wet?
![]() Dan Graham, Triangular Pavilion with Circular Cut-out Variation H - Courtesy the artist and Lisson Gallery Jes Fernie asks whether the rash of temporary pavilions in London and further afield, enlivens our streets or trivialises the provocative role of such structures. What is this itch I have about my ankles? Oh, here’s another at my elbow and another, priming itself on my nose. Ah! It’s a pavilion; a temporary structure made by an architect, or an artist or possibly both. As Tim Abrahams reported in a recent Blueprint article, there were no less than twenty pavilions scattered across London this summer, many brought to us courtesy of the hugely successful London Festival of Architecture. And like a germ on a mission to procreate they continue to multiply. Frank Gehry’s ode to vanity at the Serpentine Gallery; the ‘Portavilion’ structures in parks across London by Toby Paterson, Dan Graham, Annika Eriksson and Monika Sosnowska; and Jeppe Hein’s ‘Appearing Rooms’ outside the Royal Festival Hall. It all started when I took my kids on a trip around London on a sleepy Saturday morning. We began at the Southwark Lido, the French collective EXYZT’s ode to city living where the sun didn’t shine but we had a pleasant time hanging out on deck chairs talking to people like us who were watching the children of people like us being ritualistically cleansed in the pool in front of us. Dishevelled, insouciant French architects were lounging around in beach huts looking very much as if the ‘participation’ bit of their project was something they engaged in last night rather than this morning. Slightly soggy but light-hearted and gay, we made our way up to the South Bank to see the Psycho Buildings show at the Hayward. Oh no! A long queue. But no matter, here is a temporary structure to distract the kids from the trauma of 21st century cultural consumption. Jeppe Hein’s ‘Appearing Rooms’ is a thrill a minute. Quick! Run into the empty room while the water spurts are low. Marvel at your entrapment when the spurts rise again. Clothes now thoroughly sodden, we pad off to steam dry in Tomas Saraceno's ‘Observatory, Air-port-city’, the Buckminster-Fuller-type transparent dome located on one of the Hayward’s sculpture terraces. We lounge around in a soporific state of hazy non-participation, vaguely computing that there are human bodies traversing the dome above our heads. We shuffle to another sculpture terrace where we witness the surreal scene of people indulging in the fantasy of living a bucolic life rowing into an inner-city sunset on an artificial lake, courtesy of the Austrian artist collective Gelitin. It was a day of physical and immersive play which got me thinking about what is happening in our public realm, how art and architecture are increasingly being used as a tool to engage, involve and ‘challenge’ audiences. There are a number of themes that these artists and architects seem to be interested in exploring:
What I’m interested in is whether these projects are doing anything more than providing an opportunity to bring people together, to create a good atmosphere and get strangers talking to each other. Or do they have more bite: are they able to create a platform for dissent; a critique of contemporary politics and institutions or a platform for real social change? Or, to put it another way, is there a void where once there was political dissent or action? As Dave Beech asks in a recent essay published in Art Monthly, is there a declining ambition for the politics of participation? Is the participant merely invited to accept the parameters of an art project rather than assume the role of subversive agent? Do we go so far as Derrida who says that inclusion is a brand of neutralisation? Probably not, but extremes can sometimes be useful to construct a critical framework. How much is the government’s agenda to involve new audiences in contemporary culture related to this explosion of activity in the public realm and participatory art and architecture projects? What is the relationship to this expansion of artistic practice and the increasing privatisation of the public realm? What does ‘temporary’ allow for that ‘permanent’ is unable to offer? Is our obsession with temporariness linked to the capitalist drive to make us forget – to consume more tomorrow? Or is this interest in temporary architectural structures related to a growing fascination with the intersection of the public and the private; the permeability of exterior and interior spaces or what the critical theorist Giuliana Bruno refers to, with particular reference to the work of Rachel Whiteread, as ‘the definition of the frame of memory’? What relationship does the institution, in particular, the art gallery, have to the public realm? Is the expanding number of off-site programmes and art and architecture biennials which take the city as a starting point for discussion, an instrumentalisation of art and architecture or a welcome implosion of the gallery walls? And finally, is this activity indicative of a general move towards ‘easy art’ or the public realm equivalent of Julian Stallabrass’ highartlite. A sort of immerse-yourself-in-a-physical-or-social-situation-and-forget-the-rest type of hedonism or do these projects provoke serious questions for those who interact with them? I am genuinely unable to make up my mind where I stand on this issue. On the one hand, these structures quite clearly enliven our streets and create extraordinary opportunities for artists and architects to play a part in shaping our public realm and it seems churlish to bash that. But I can’t help thinking that more subversion, dirt and dissonance needs to be bred into these structures; we need more public realm equivalents of Velvet Underground’s ‘Venus in Furs’.
For more writing by Jes Fernie visit www.jesfernie.com |
![]() ![]() ACN Headquarters are in Cowcross Street, London 15/09/08 Architecture Centre Network seeking a Chief Executive Officer We are looking for a Chief Executive Officer to encourage innovative and creative strategies that continue to strengthen the UK’s architecture and built environment centres, and work with cultural and other organisations to deepen public engagement with architecture. See our jobs page (News section) for further information and application pack. Related Architecture Centre: Chief Executive Officer, London, Clerkenwell ![]() Architecture Crew mapnewham.com project, Fundamental Architectural Inclusion. 15/08/08 Futurescape08 Futurescape08 Emerging technologies - shaping future learning for the built environment sector 16 17 October 2008 London Knowledge Lab, 23-29 Emerald Street, London WC1N 3QS The impact of emerging technology is being felt across the learning landscape. This symposium is an opportunity to hear from experts in the field on what the future holds for built environment education and how we as leaders and educators can shape it. SPEAKERS Professor Angela McFarlane, Director of Content and Learning, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Chair in Education, Graduate School of Education, University of Bristol Doctor Tim Rudd, Senior Researcher, Futurelab Doctor James Bradburne, Director General, Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi and Research Fellow, London Knowledge Lab Peter Carne, Learning Outside The Classroom WORKSHOPS Embedded Technologies with London Knowledge Lab Slow Furl by artist, Mette Ramsgard and Karin Bech, Centre for Interactive Technology and Architecture, Copenhagen and the School of Architecture and Design, University of Brighton Matt Bell, Director of Campaigns & Education, CABE Futurescape08 is led by the Architecture Centre Network and CABE, with academic partner, London Knowledge Lab (Birkbeck and Institute of Education). Who should attend? To register your interest and book a place, please contact: Charge*: *Lunch and refreshments included in these charges ![]() Image © 2008 Fundamental Architectural Inclusion 24/06/08 'Enter the Centre' Podcasts: Newcastle, Liverpool and Newham, East London Tom Dyckoff, The Times Architecture Critic and BBC Culture Show presenter, introduces the streets of Liverpool, Newcastle and Newham in the company of cultural leaders, academics and young people. Amidst the noise, traffic and dreaming spires, architectural inspiration and challenge is found. How are our cities shaping up under mass-regeneration and is the future hopeful? Northern Architecture Centre, Newcastle A Texan take on the regionalist architecture of Newcastle, and its metamorphosis from a city of the car to its Georgian, pedestrian roots. Physical exertion and erudite commentary make this compelling material for anyone involved in reconfiguring the skyline and celebrating the distinctiveness of our cities. Speakers
Places Matter!, Liverpool Places Matter! the Architecture Centre for the North West, invites you to experience their home city, Liverpool, European Capital of Culture 2008. Amidst the incessant noise of building Rod Holmes leads the way into Liverpool One, Jude Kelly stands on a railway station platform and Arthur Dunster marvels at Richard Wilson's landmark revolving artwork 'Turning the Place Over'. Speakers
Fundamental Architectural Inclusion, Newham, London In Newham a creaking lift moves young people past retirement flats to a viewing platform for the Olympic site and they reflect on their frustrations and futures in an area under massive transformation. Will this be the dream ticket or leave them with no place to call their own? Speakers
Podcast Producer: Ruby Wright Commissioned by Architecture Centre Network in partnership with Northern Architecture, Places Matter! Liverpool, Fundamental Architectural Inclusion, Newham, London For more information on how to enter visit 'Enter the Centre' podcasts available for download at Ruby Wright's blog Related Architecture Centre: Northern Architecture |