in an ongoing effort to use my free time wisely, i've peppered my calendar with several events related to architecture week.
as an outsider to the profession but someone with a growing interest in preservation and planning (and an abiding love for this town), these lectures represent an opportunity to hear the architects/artists/designers articulate their intent for a project, in the language of their discipline. i always expect there to be moments where i'm overwhelmed by the architecture jargon, but i always hope to come out with a notion or two for how to re-consider a structure or a space.
the week's festivities kicked off this morning, with the center welcoming elizabeth diller (of diller scofidio +renfro). her presentation focused on the firm's new york projects, from their earliest site specific art installations (which culminated in a 2003 mid-career retrospective at the whitney) to the grander architectural collaborations (recently, the high line and lincoln center). she spoke very little if at all about the projects' architectural or structural details, and more about their interest in the conventions of theatrical space and "visionality" (the culture of vision, "framing" vision, how architecture can allow or deny vision).
i've attended community board hearings for the preservation of the high line and felt like i "knew" that project pretty well from a preservationists' perspective, and i've had the hallmarks of the "new" lincoln center pointed out to me on a recent tour, but it wasn't until today, after listening to ms. diller and looking at the drawings and animations that i started to understand and appreciate the intent of the firm's work: to gather an audience through design that is both theatrical and ultimately democratic.
the team also presented designs for other architectural projects, some accepted (the museum of image and sound in rio), others rejected (the national museum of african-american history in dc), and installations like these joyful trees, in liverpool.
this bioengineering experiment created for the 2008 liverpool biennial is meant to turn the idea of public parks on its head. 3 trees within a grove were planted at a 10 degree bias on turntables that were set to rotate at different speeds. sometimes the trees kiss, or brush up against each other. as you stand in the space, the trees move past you....
this is growing on me...
what do you think?
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tomorrow at AIA:
9-11AM
parks and recreation commissioner adrian benepe, discusses nyc parks...
parks & recreation manages 29,000 acres (14% of nyc), including nearly 4,000 properties ranging from washington square and east river parks to community gardens and greenstreets. custodian of 2.5 million trees, parks commissioner adrian benepe has emerged as a design catalyst in the bloomberg administration.
6-8PM (exhibition opening): context/contrast: new architecture in historic districts
new york is often imagined as a perennially new city, yet in the four decades since the 1965 passage of the new york landmarks law, it has become one of the strongest forces for historic preservation in the country. context/contrast asks how the commission’s charge of ensuring “appropriate” new architecture in historic districts has allowed neighborhoods to evolve without endangering the essential character that contributes to their public value and makes them worth protecting.
and, wednesday:
a tour of greenwich south
a lecture and guided tour of a newly installed exhibit in zuccotti park, depicting a visionary future for greenwich south. the area below the world trade center site, sandwiched between battery park city and the financial district, offers both immense challenges and unique opportunities for intervention and design, from subtle to grand, in scale and intention. leading design consultants from the architecture research office and beyer blinder belle will guide participants through the exhibit with bold provocations for the planning of lower manhattan.
