Ai Weiwei at the Royal Academy
– by Rozie Saunders – In October of 2010, Ai Weiwei filled the turbine hall at the Tate Modern with 100 million handmade porcelain sunflower seeds. In April 2011, he was arrested by the Chinese government and held at a secret location in solitary confinement for 81 days. His passport was confiscated for four years and not returned until July, this year. For the first time since Sunflower Seeds, Ai Weiwei has been able...
Playing Rough
Review by Matt Bloomfield | 01 August 2015 This summer in London has seen the opening of two exhibitions, both set against a backdrop of brutalism and with a pronounced vein of playfulness. The RIBA Gallery is currently occupied by The Brutalist Playground, an interactive installation created by architecture and design collective du jour- Assemble, in collaboration with artist Simon Terrill. Meanwhile, the Hayward Gallery on the...
A Tale of Two Cities
by Rozie Saunders | 10 July 2015 Are soaring property prices that push young Londoners out of their city, simply a price for London’s global success? Is London becoming a millionaires’ playground rather than a bustling model of urban living? We report on the city’s perceived identity crisis. London is allegedly losing its sense of self. The consensus seems to be that ordinary people are being priced out of the housing...
‘What is public space’ Future Cities Salon, Porto
Alastair Donald | 22 June 2015 In Porto this week the Future Cities Salon continues its series of discussions on the future of public space. Early 20th century Modernism sought to provide public open space within cities as a release from the confines of overcrowded, unsanitary slums. Nowadays, public space is everywhere but there is less recognition and more proscription about what and who it is for. Many 20th-century residential...
White City Black City
Rozie Saunders | 20 May 2015 Sharon Rotbard’s “White City Black City: Architecture and War in Tel Aviv and Jaffa” is much more than just an architectural history of Tel Aviv and Jaffa. The author, an Israeli architect and writer born in Tel Aviv, explores its development, and its sister city Jaffa through the lens of someone who has lived there continuously for decades. A critical examination of the accepted history of...
In defence of a Defence of Stars and Icons
Austin Williams | 20 April 2015 It is a sad indictment of current architectural debate (as well as critical political debate more generally) that Patrik Schumacher’s latest article is creating such a fuss. Fans of Walter Benjamin – the unread darling of the Situationist mainstream – wouldn’t dream of criticising his statement “The public must always be proved wrong, yet always feel represented by the...
The Evolution of a Modern Man
Matt Bloomfield | 17 March 2015 Review of Mackintosh Architecture, The Architecture Gallery, RIBA Conveniently coinciding with Prince Charles’ latest foray into Architecture, the RIBA’s Mackintosh Architecture exhibition expertly illustrates the third way between historic pastiche and bland commercialisation. The exhibition brings together Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s work from his early days as an apprentice at...
House: The Dematerialized Home
Nicolò Lewanski | 17 February 2015 It is not so often we have the chance to attend a debate where every speaker is precise. When we do it is a pleasure, and such was the case last month when some of the contributors featured in the book SQM: The Quantified Home spoke at the Architectural Association (AA) in London. Produced for the 2014 Biennale Interieur, this project aims to launch a new discussion on the present and the future of...
Film Review ‘The Big City’
Martin Earnshaw | 25 January 2015 The Big City (1963), directed by Satyajit Ray, is essentially a story of modernity. The superb opening scene traces the passage of a tram cable as it winds its way through Calcutta, a city which in the 1950s and 60s could be considered as India’s foremost modern city. Although this old Imperial Capital was soon to be eclipsed by Mumbai, at that moment, to be at the forefront of change was to be in...
Film Review: ‘City Visions’ #6
Matthew Bloomfield | 7 January 2015 The Airstrip: Decampment of Modernism, Part III. Dir. Heinz Emigholz, 2014 Heinz Emigholz’s ongoing meditation on architecture continues in this feature length piece, composed around the metaphor of a falling bomb. Between the time that the bomb is released and the time that it explodes, there exists a duality where the target remains intact but is doomed to destruction. What the audience...
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