Biennale - Problems and Solutions

The Biennale is divided into two main areas.

The Giardini: A beautiful parkland surrounding with pavilions scattered between the trees and gardens

The Arsenale: A largely disused naval dockyard, comprising of a series of large disused warehouses

To break the biennale visit up, we visited each site on a different day, spending around 6 hours in each. There was just so much to see and so little time!

The Biennale theme was “People meet in Architecture” and explored different ways people and architects perceive architecture / space and what is most important to them. There was a wide ranging scope and variety of entries. Some from artworks, model displays, traditional vernacular ideas of architecture and a select few dealt with the idea of sustainability and its role in Architecture today. For the purpose of this Blog, I hope to focus more on the sustainability issues, to present the ideas of some to many.

Below is a range of exhibitions I found interesting and enlightening.

Netherlands:

As you walk into the Netherlands Exhibition, the first thing you notice, is a vastly vacant room. The walls are painted white and the floor is a bare light coloured polished concrete. Lone standing Fire Extinguishers give the space an equally sterile feel. It isn’t untill you look up and notice thousands of blue foam squares suspended on the ceiling that you realise there is more to this exhibition. A large sign on the door reads:

“THIS BUILDING HAS BEEN VACANT FOR MORE THAN 39 YEARS”

This exhibition space is in use for 3.5 months each year. The pavilion was built in 1954 and has been vacant for 39 years

Like all the biennale exhibition buildings in the Giardini, they are predominantly unnocupied.

The Submission:

A clear perspex display outlines the intention of the Exhibition:

Vacant NL, Where architecture meets ideas:

“This installation is a call for the intelligent reuse of inspiring, vacant buidings in promoting creative enterprise. It utilizes enourmous potential of temporary unoccupied buildings from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries in the Netherlands.

We propose temporary use as a strategy and uses vacancy for innovation within the creative knowledge economy.

The complex challenges that our society faces today call for innovation: for a culture centred on design skills and cooperation between scientists and creative pioneers.

Vancant NL will enable and support new connections between different professional fields. This submission shows that architecture can contribute to pinpointing and solving the complex challenges facing the worlds at the moment. Starting nationally, aiming globally” (Netherlands exhibition – 2010)

From here, you are guided up a set of stairs where you transition from a completely empty space with seemingly floating blue blocks, to a fully suspended city of buildings. The impact of this is tremendous. There is a huge array of building types to be seen, arranged in a mock city above an empty space. Buildings including, office towers, warehouses, barns and windmills stretch from wall to wall.

It does get you thinking immediately about the amount of un-used vacant space not only in one city, but around the world. Why do these buildings lay empty, dormant? Instead of building new buildings from new materials which use vast amounts of energy, why can we not further use and adapt what we already have?

This exhibition set an overtone for what would is the rest of the biennale for me. It was a turning point in my thought process. There are so many aspects to sustainability, many of which are untouched. Sustainable architecture can not exist in a “throw away society”. We must re-use and recycle what buildings we already have. This exhibition reveals the enormous quantity and diversity of temporarily avaliable property around the world and questions the range of possibilities for use they offer.

The idea of temporary re-use has the ability to create life, to re-activate cities. To house the homeless? To regenerate.

“This exhibition aims to inspire designers, property developers, and policy-makers to come up with architecture that is not just functional and aesthetically pleasing, but which also sets a positive change in motion” (Reitveld Landscape)

RE-USING INDIVIDUAL VACANT BUILDINGS CAN MAKE A GLOBAL DIFFERENCE.

For more information visit:

http://www.nai.nl/

http://www.architectureofconsequence.nl/

http://www.rietveldlandscape.nl/

Danish Exhibition:

The exhibition raises a number of urban design and masterplanning questions and presents the answers reached in Copenhagen. It provides an insight into the huge changes that have taken place in Copenhagen in the past ten years – from the massive urban development programme at Ørestad to new cultural landmarks and green urban spaces in the old working-class areas.

At the same time, the exhibition looks to the future, asking the question: How can we build on the experience of these past ten years and continue to create the right settings for growth and welfare in the future?

(For more Photo's from the Danish Architecture Centre - Flicker website visit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/31434789@N03/sets/72157624170012761/)

Ten years into the 21st century, it is clear that humans and the environment share the common destiny of cities. Only by creating sensible and sustainable urban communities can we ensure the welfare of the planet and its people.

But what is a sustainable urban community? What kind of challenges, questions and parameters are changing the development paradigm for urban communities, old and new?

The Danish exhibition is divided into two sections, an intereactive “Questions” area where people are invited to put forward Questions of urban revitalisation, sustainability and development. The second of which is a movie theatre , which represents the “answers” where a 3D movie is on continuous loop.

The Movie below is a must watch. It outlines a Vision for Copenhagen drawing on its history and promoting the concept of the “thinking city,” posing urban questions and presenting the answers reached in Copenhagen. It uses Copenhagen as a ”living Lab” of sustainable urban development.

Full Credit Goes to The Danish Exhibition and its exhibitors. For more information Visit:

http://english.dac.dk/

The Exhibition has answers to questions including:

How can we stimulate the use of bicycles as alternatives to cars?

How can we reclaim the waterfront of former industrial ports in creating new urban areas?

How can we create urban space that encourages physical activity in a compact city?

How can we promote social inclusion through urban planning?

How can we use architecture to add value to public space?

How can we accomodate local needs when revitalizing a city district?

How do we use a strategy of temporary interventions to create a new city within the city?

How do we transform a former industrial port into a dense and dynamic waterfront district?

How do we create a completely new city district on the edge of nature?

How do we tie two countries together in one metropolitan loop?

How many masterpieces does a city need?

For me, this Exhibition crystalises that whilst each individual building must have its own sustainability agenda, buildings form a city which must act harmoniously in order to function. Sustainability has many aspects, each aspect must work together to form a whole.

INDIVIDUAL BUILDINGS WORKING TOGETHER TO MAKE A GLOBAL DIFFERENCE

Opensimsim:

Opensimsim is the manifestation of the idea of knowledge sharing. It is based on the fact that around 98% of all built works in the world are not completed by Architects and that sustainable design is to complex to be done by a small design team. It believes that the design process must have more knowledge rich foundations, by including more skilled designers from Architecs, Enginners to Manufacturers and Scientists in the design process

Opensimsim is a realisation that we are in transition from a corporate-owned consumer world to a community-driven system of participation, where people enjoy contributing their knowledge and time to the greater public for free. Could urbanism and architecture also benefit from this idea? 

OpenSimSim is a community-driven platform that enhances the architectural design and building process. The design process is given a contemporary spin: an interested community offers their input and feedback on the design. It provides user-generated content for projects, where users help with needs and requests, as well as take part in the implementation and revision, providing valuable knowledge along the way. The goal is to define new objectives, develop strategies to initiate activities, meet people in the architecture field, make the design process more transparent, and create new visions. It is available to anybody in the world who cares about design.

At the biennale, 15 open source designs by international design studios of what is called an "intelligent living pod". Each pod was avaliable by interacting with a computer monitor and design card placed in front. Once you pick up the design card, the computer monitor displays a 3D model of the design rotating with the users movements. I have attached some photo's of me investigating the 3d model space. You are then prompted to leave comments on the design. The idea being, that from around 150,000 visitors to the biennale would be able to contribute to the world-wide knowledge base - the idea of Open sourcing - or Opensimsim.

This method of model exploritory is new for me. The technology enables the user to fully experience the model space from all angles through hand and eye co-ordination. This technology could be implemented to further explore intimate details of design, long before a physical prototype is developed.

INDIVIDUALS SHARING KNOWLEDGE AND WORKING TOGETHER CAN MAKE A GLOBAL DIFFERENCE.

For more information, Visit:  http://opensimsim.net/

The Mississippi Delta: Constructing with water
(Part of the american pavillion exhibition)

Constructing with water deals with the Global issue of raised sea levels due to climate change.The need for new approaches to protect coastal communities from flooding, storm surge damage, and land loss is becoming more critical as sea levels rise. Experience shows that traditional hard infrastructural storm barrier solutions such as sea walls and levees must be reconsidered, especially as recent storms show increased reach and intensity. The mississippi river drains the primary water shed of North America, ending in a land-building delta at the gulf of mexico. Over time, the Mississippi has shifted its course, requiring flood levee interventions to ensure low lying developments on wetlands and coastal basins is prevented. The Mississippi Delta has been examined to make the case for an adaptive soft infrastructure, which integrates engineering, ecological, urban, and landscape design approaches in order to restore and improve nature while protecting and enhancing culture.

In its conceptual approach, the design team proposed opening up the river in five spots and creating diversions or basins that would fill with sediment and eventually rebuild central wetlands, taking into account what that would mean not only for the landscape but for the inhabitants who currently live there. The design fully utilises the rivers ability to carry and deposit rich sediment to re-claim land that will, over time be lost due to climate change.

Their designs include visualizations of new paradigms for building communities, changing infrastructure to support more sustainable and resilient living and three-dimensional maps of the coast with new land-building capacity.

We as designers need to ensure that we adapt and respond to the ever changing environment. We need to be aware that climate change is real, and that adpative and creative solutions for low lying areas are required to ensure thier survival.

GRAND SCALE PROBLEMS REQUIRE GRAND SCALE SOLUTIONS.

Australian Exhibition: Now and When.

The Australian Pavillion was predominantly an expression of ideas through digital medium - specifically 3D Stereosonic animations.

The Pavillion is divided into two parts:

The NOW component by photographer John Gollings was a collection of 3D aerial images of Cities and urban sprawl of Melbourne, Sydney and Surfers paradise. This was then contrasted by the arid and industrial component of Australia with mining pits in Kalgoorlie and Newman.

The WHEN component features a nine minute montage of design ideas and conceptions from 17 Australian architectural groups of possible future urban environments, based on the year 2100 - including floating cities, submerged cities, and new desert spaces.

The Visualisations are world class, with the ideas interesting and thought provoking.
The full Video is Avaliable from the AIA Website here: http://www.architecture.com.au/nowandwhen/

Here is a link to Interviews from the Vernissage with architects Ross Donaldson (Woods Bagot), Stefan Mee (John Wardle Architects) and Ian McDougall (Ashton Raggatt McDougall) about the Now + When: Australian Urbanism exhibition at the Venice Architecture Biennale 2010

Had such a great time on Day 1. Next Blog will be a little more light on. Lots of interesting investigations on space, Art and Architecture!

Venice

After a long wait in the Bilbao Airport, we finally jump on the plane to head to Venice. Our first stop is Munich, where we get on a connecting flight to Venice. Again, we lined up in a que to jump on an airport bus, this time in cold rainy conditions to get on a small plane out in the middle of the runway. The plane, was very, very small and gave an un-nerving feeling to us both as we overhear flight attendant conversations and irritated passengers agrivated due to the delayed flight. None the less we have a safe journey and get to the hotel at around 12:30am. Phew!

The next day, we jumped on a local bus and headed straight into Venice. This is not our first time to Venice, so we did know what to expect, although it never disappoints. Venice is such a beautiful city, no matter where you look. Its small laneways and bridges provide a new vista at every turn. Canals are everywhere, along with tourists. We decided to just head in the general direction of the Biennale and stroll along the streets till we got there. Here are just a few shots along the way….







It wasn’t long before we hit the Piazza San Marco. Probably the most famous square in Venice, it sits in front of Saint Marc’s Basilica and is surrounded by buildings. I think the best part of this square are its proportions. Around 2 to 1 LxW. It just feels right. The other great thing is that this square is solely a pedestrian only public square, where the sound of people, not vehicles dominate the space.





From here, we then headed toward the Giardini and stopped on the way to grab an early lunch, for we had a huge afternoon ahead of us! So, we sat in a relaxing café and had some fantastic pasta and pizza for lunch whilst watching the tourists walk by. Oh the life!!



After lunch we headed for the Biennale.



We spent all afternoon here in fact. With many, many exhibits from countries from all over the world. It was a spectacular display of art, sculpture and Architecture. Obviously with far to many to tell in this blog. I will show you a taste of some of my favorites.

Later in this blog, there will be a discussion section dealing with the issues of Technology and sustainability. So I thought, rather than mixing this through the blog, I would combine it at the end.

Update...

Hi everyone, Just letting you know I'm having a blast at the venice biennale. Lots here to see and do! Will update the blog when I can get some more internet time.

Ciao....

Mick.

Bilbao

We left Barcelona early morning on a high speed train. We were both still quite exhausted from the previous couple of days walking so we used this opportunity to try and grab another couple of hours sleep. The spanish countryside is just beautiful. In some areas, it does look quite dry and dessert like, and in others it is quite lush and dense. It wasn’t too long before we started to head up into the hills. The train slowed and weaved its way through some valleys until finally arriving in Bilbao (6 or so hours later)
Immediately the first thing we both noticed was the temperature…. It was cool. Pleasantly cool, a refreshing change from the almost unbearable heat of Barcelona. The Abando station (the main train station in Bilbao) has a spectacular stained glass window visible from all platforms. A little different I thought for a train station.



Immediately we started for the hotel to dump our bags. We got some dodgy information from the ticket booth and headed onto the local metro to a station somewhere up on the hill. We got off at the advised station, and upon looking at the local map on the wall (which looked almost nothing like the one we had printed off google maps) we jumped back on the train and headed to the next station. We were heading blind, as we had no map, only the fact that I had spotted on the way into the train station our hotel, as it had a huge green sign on the top. So this was all we had to go on really. After around 30 minutes of feeling our way around the suburbs of Bilbao, we found the hotel. We then headed straight for the city, I couldn’t wait any longer, I had to at least see the Guggenheim, even if we weren’t going in it until the following day. As we were heading into the main township, we could hear lots of people, lots of drunk people??? As we got closer to town we found that the City had a festival going called the Aste Nagusia. I believe this translates to "the big week" and is supposed to be one of the most vibrant festivals in Spain, as Bilbao celebrates its Basque heritage. Over 100,000 locals take part in the party, which includes the Strongman games, nightly firework displays, live music and lots of eating and drinking. Events are held all over the city in plazas, parks and churches over nine long days in August. This is all fantastic, If you speak Spanish. Everything was closed, all the restaurants, shops etc. Everyone was out partying. This was going to be a slight problem, as the food that was being served at the makeshift tent kitchens did not look all that crash hot, and the smell that was around town smelt like stale vomit. (maybe that was why they were spraying the roads and footpaths with a lemon scented water??)

We wandered down the main street and it was a similar story here also….
Everything was closed. Not a single shop open. God I thought, I hope the Guggenheim is going to be open??. We turned down a street that lead to the museum and low and behold there it was. It stands out as a shining beacon in the city. It really is magnificent. The titanium sheeting which covers the majority of the building reflects in the sunlight. A flower covered bear stands at the main entryway.




The building is extremely complex in its geometry, with twists and curves, some clad in limestone, some in titanium and some in glass, Its is a complex series of spaces with a huge atrium space in the middle. The main entryway is at the foot of an enourmaous glass atrium space.



We walked around the building finding more pieces of artwork scattered around. A huge spider on massive legs sits between the building and the Bilbao River.



We walked along the river back to the hotel through part of the festival. There were thousands of kids all having their faces painted, riding on different attractions and just generally either screaming with joy or screaming with discontent….. We were out of there!! We headed back to the hotel (which was very comfy) and had an early night. Fireworks woke us up at around 11pm and lasted for a good 30 minutes. No expense spared here in Bilbao, they were magnificent! I think we may have had the best view from out Hotel room window!

The next day we headed back into the city… It was much quiter this time. Most people were moving very very slowly….. clearly hanging onto a hangover! We headed down the main street expecting to see the shops open and again nothing, So we heade back to the Guggenheim to visit the artwork. Unfortunately photos are not allowed inside the museum, but you should check out the museum works. These can be seen at: http://www.guggenheim.org/bilbao

Clearly for me, the most outstanding work is the permanent collection from Richard Serra. Here, he uses a complex series of shapes to create sculpture pieces that you walk through and around, sensing the space as it changes…. Very cool!!

For me, the Guggenheim is a very interesting building, but I do find the complex series of shapes confusing at times. It seems like an over complicated answer to a fairly simple problem. But having said that. Its is a truly amazing building.

The next day we headed up the hill from the hotel to check out hte city from above.


Not far from here we sore the tops of what looked like huge umbrellas. Upon closer inspection, it was a petrol station. Very cool!!





Not sure who the architect is here, but I believe there is a similar one in Barcelona too.

We also took a walk past the still under construction basketball arena in Bilbao. Again, cant find the architect for this one at first glance, Will get back to you on that one.




We jumped onto the metro again to head out to the Bilbao Exhibition centre, just outside of town. Designed by Norman Forster, each matro station is quite similar, with precast concrete elements and feature structural stainless steel elements. The stations were clean and easy to use, although left you feeling a little dull. Some colour was needed fo me??
Still very nicely detailed!





The bilbao exhibition centre by ACXT was our next destination. This is a huge building, containing 150,000 m2 of exhibition space distributed between 6 halls, all without columns.
The 18,000 m2 congress centre is the perfect venue for conventions, seminars,presentations, celebrations, gala dinners, etc. Unfortunately the centre was closed and I was only able to walk around the building (which took around 30 minutes) It truly is massive.

Formore info on this building, check out: http://www.bilbaoexhibitioncentre.com/portal/page/portal/GRP_BEC/P_BEC_PRINCIPALRECINTO

Our last day in Bilbao saw the end of the festival. This meant the shops were open, So we indulged in a little retail therapy before heading to the airport.

The Bilbao Airport is another remarkable building by Calatrava. I have blabbed on enough about Calatrava in a previous post so I need not say any more.... here are some pics.






We head from here to Venice via Munich. Here we will see the Biennale.

Cheers,
Mick.

Barcelona - Day 2

Our second day in Barcelona was going to be a little slower than the last. This is such an enormous city, it is an absolute must to find some means of transport. Again, the metro is excellent… Just watch your belongings as we were warned by the metro attendants about pickpockets. Although we have not yet encountered any.

Hot Tip #10: If the attendants are telling you to watch your belongings, You definately look like a tourist!

First on the list is Meis Van der roh’s Barcelona Pavillion. This was at first constructed as a temporary building for the International Exposition in Barcelona of 1929. Though temporary, it was still made of permanent materials consisting of steel, glass, marble, and travertine. The single story building has no real function, although there is a small bookshop in one of the small rooms. The plan is asymmetric and fluid with a continuous flow of space. Wall partitions are made of both transparent and opaque glass as well as highly polished marble. The low flat roof is supported by delicate metal supports. It is a surprisingly simple space made more beautiful by a large reflection pond in the centre. It feels like a fabulous space, made by a simple, elegant building made from quality materials. A must see in any Barcelona Trip.





Heading up the hill from the pavilion lies the Barcelona Olympic site. Again we wandered up the hill to find more external escalators….. Thank you to whoever put these in!! It wasn’t long before we were at the top and starring at yet another Calatrava installation. The tower was built for Telefonica (the spanish version of Telstra) to transmit television coverage of the 1992 summer Olympic games in Barcelona. The tower I believe represents an athlete holding the Olympic flame.



Another unique feature of this tower is that due to its orientation, it can be used as a giant sundial which uses the Europa square to indicate the hour. The tower is typical of Calatravas work I have seen so far. Using the two elements of concrete and steel to create seemingly impossible structures. The base of the tower is again covered in a mosaic of tiles creating a reflection pool around the base. (although when we were there this was dry)




From here we headed back down the mountain past the National museum of art and back into the metro to head out to the western end of the Diagonal where I belived that some new work was being done by architects including Toyo Ito’s new Porta Fira Towers. I was wrong. I could not find it anywhere and had no internet access to find out where the hell it was. I could see it from the calatrava tower, so we jumped on the tram and headed further west. Every now and then, I could see a glimpse of it in the distance…..Here is a glimpse of what we didnt get to see.... :(



Hot Tip #11: Always check where you are going, before you try to go there!!

It was getting late in the afternoon, and we still had not had any lunch, so we abandoned this trip and headed back into town for some lunch. Whilst we were there, we took the chance to look through some shops before heading back to the hotel to freshen up. I particularly wanted to back to the torre Agbar to see its colourful illumination at night. At around 6pm (still very light) we walked down the Diagonal past the tower itself to some newer developments to the east. Here we found a couple of finds:

CAM FRAMIS Museum by Jordi Badia,



Indra Corporate Building by b720 + R&AS



The ME Hotel (Habitat) by Dominique Perrault, 2008

But of most interest was the Media-TIC by Enric Ruiz Geli. The entire building hangs from a portal frame structure creating a completely column free space at ground level.

The building is clad in a unique form of inflatable panel called ETFE. This is a hybrid material (Ethylene Tetra Fluoro Ethylene) with very special characteristics. ETFE cladding is inflatable, with up to three air chambers. This not only improves thermal insulation, but also makes it possible to create shade by means of a pneumatic system. I found an excellent PDF from from the architects website explaining the building, its structural system, design and sustainability characteristics. It includes a full explanation of the ETFE product. I have never seen this type of system before. Its worth the look!


Check this out at: http://www.ruiz-geli.com/media/.../Mediatic/mediaticpdf/PresentacionMEDIA-TIC_web_EN.pdf%20-

We grabbed a Gelato to fill in some time and soon enough (at around 9:30) it was dark enough to see off in the distance the Torre Agbar in illumination. Check out the pics!




On the way back to the Hotel we stopped by the Sangrada Familiar also to take a few night shots.


We are off to Bilbao next, Primarily to check out Frank Ghery’s Guggenheim.

Hope you are all well..

More on Bilbao to come shortly.

Mick.