The 14th Venice International Architecture Biennale closed a week ago, but it looks like some of the themes tackled by the projects showcased during it are inspiring further projects and events.
Moving from Rem Koolhaas's brief to the national pavilions in the Giardini of the Biennale - "Absorbing Modernity, 1914 to 2014", London College of Fashion's Alison Moloney (Curator, International Exhibitions Programme) invited four curators to express a moment in fashion or dress from 1914.
The four curators - Walter Van Beirendonck, Amy de la Haye, Judith Clark and Kaat Debo - were all matched with a filmmaker, including Bart Hess, James Norton, Katerina Athanasopoulou and Marie Schuller.
The evening screening of the films, hosted by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) in partnership with the London College of Fashion, will include an 'in conversation' session between Amy de la Haye and architectural historian Timothy Brittian-Catlin who will look at architecture and dress in the build up to 1914.
A panel discussion (confirmed speakers include Amy de la Haye, Timothy Brittain Catlin, Judith Clark, Alison Moloney, Katerina Athanasopoulou, Marie Schuller, James Norton and Kaat Debo) on the films, modernity in dress and fashion curation will then follow.
1914 Now is at RIBA, 66 Portland Place, London W1B 1AD, 9th December 2014, 6.45 pm - 10.00 pm
The British Film Institute re-released yesterday the film in the UK (well-timed with the release of the Star Wars: The Force Awakens teaser trailer...) as part of their blockbuster Science Fiction project.
Co-written by Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke, 2001: A Space Odyssey is universally considered as one of the key films of this visionary genre, but it has also got a wonderful fashion connection. The costume designer behind this movie was indeed Hardy Amies, more famous for being the official designer of Queen Elizabeth II and for dressing other members of the British Royal Family.
While the film captures the spirit of the '60s and of Space Age fashion incarnated in Paris by Pierre Cardin and André Courrèges, Amies also managed to give his designs a timeless edge that set the standards for further sci-fi stories and films.
The couturier did so by focusing on clean and pure lines for both his men and women's costumes rather than going over the top with colours and materials.
Though Amies represented the quintessential Savile Row tailor, he managed to create a supermodern wardrobe not just for the city and the country, but also for the spaceship that consisted in more conservative '60s tweed suits for the executives in the film (no ties though) that were still characterised by sharp tailored silhouettes; futuristic stewardesses uniforms matched with helmet-like headdresses by Royal milliner Freddie Fox and vivid yellow, blue, red spacesuits plus grey coveralls for the astronauts on the space stations.
Amies' sketches for the costumes (rediscovered only a few years ago in the Hardy Amies basement) were also part of the Kubrick exhibition that took place between 2012 and 2013 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA).
In that occasion the museum released previously unseen production stills from many Kubrick films, some of them portraying the spaceship crew for 2001: A Space Odyssey, or a lovely space stewardess elegantly posing in a pink suit next to a portable videophone.
The timeless designs behind this film show us that it takes a lot of talent to create a perfect work of art and that it takes a proper designer to make memorable costumes (and not a stylist...see The Hunger Games saga).
Balenciaga's Autumn/Winter 2010-11 collection borrowed quite a few elements from A Space Odyssey, so you can be sure this re-release and will bring once again the film and its stylised vision of outer space on the runways.
In case you're a fashion designer and you're looking for further inspirations related to this film, you can watch the short documentary embedded here entitled "Stanley Kubrick & Hardy Amies: 2001: A Space Odyssey, When Fashion and the Future Collide", that reveals some of the inside stories behind the costumes for this movie.
The first impression you get when you see Heather Marie Scholl's installation "Sometimes It's Hard to Be a Woman" is that of seeing a fairytale romance. The two mannequin standing in front of you - a man and a woman clad in costumes covered in delicate embroideries - are indeed holding hands.
Yet, when you look a bit better, you discover there is something disquieting and disturbing: semen drips (scroll down and read Scholl's interview to discover the layered meaning behind it) from a codpiece sticking from under the period coat donned by the male dummy, while the red petals scattered on the woman's white dress point towards blood and therefore violence.
Moving from Tammy Wynette's "Stand by your Man", Scholl addresses through this installation - displayed at the Freeman Space in Brooklyn at the beginning of November - issues of domestic violence, dating based sexual assaults and the subtle signs and traits of abusive relationships.
We all employ fashion to express our personality and personal narratives, but Scholl has found a way to use the fashion medium to look at several issues - body, women, feminism, identity, and sexuality - in a striking way that elicits the response of the viewer and sparks the debate about such topics.
While the artist and designers explains today in this interview the meanings and symbolism behind her installation, she also remains with us for the rest of the day for a Black Friday Competition.
Scholl is offering as a thank you note to all the Irenebrination readers who have been following her through previous posts her silver plated 3D lapel pin of the HMS legs logo in a little competition event.
The competition is open to readers based all over the world and takes place today from the moment this post goes live until midnight. The winner is the first person who retweets this post and sends their personal details (name and full address) to the email [email protected] with the subject "Heather Marie Scholl Black Friday Giveaway".
If you take part but don't win, don't despair: Scholl has recently relaunched her shop with several items available in limited quantities of 20 each. There are prints, self portraits, necklaces and pins on offer, and, from today until December 1st 2014, there is also a holiday discount (20% off when you use code OWNHMS1). Good luck with the competition, enjoy your shopping and scroll down to read the interview with Heather Marie Scholl.
Style-wise the costumes in the installation make us think about Romaticism while the embroideries point us towards the Renaissance. Can you tell us more about the symbolisms behind the installation? Heather Marie Scholl: With this work I knew I wanted to create a fairytale-like setting. Fairytales are timeless and I see issues of relationship violence as timeless as well. We have been forming relationships and doing things that harm each other for generations. For me a merging of Romanticism and the Renaissance is the perfect dark and beautiful aesthetic platform. The embroidery in each look carries special meanings and metaphors: on her dress there are roses and Botticelli's Venus, both of these represent idealized femininity and sexuality; on his jacket there is Michelangelo's David, a symbol of perfect masculinity. The tree wrapping around the edges of his jacket is a hawthorne tree; as it moves up the jacket it shows each stage of growth - bare, leaves, flowers, berries. This is a symbol of masculine energy - particularly in the bare stage when it's a dark omen, and feminine, fertility energy in the blooming and fruit stages. I loved that it had these layers of meaning to it. This choice of imagery and the romantic display of the figures points to how we can be so busy trying to be who we should be - especially in heterosexual romantic relationships - that we don't notice the ways we are being destroyed. And the ways we are destroying.
There are disturbing elements in the installation - semen trickles from the penis forming a pool around the feet of the male figure, and red petals make us think about blood - are these hints at violence, at the hardest aspects of 'being a woman'? Heather Marie Scholl: This imagery is intended to point at violence but in a subtle way, because violence is not just physical violence. What is dripping from his codpiece is actually bleach water. It may not be obvious in the photos but her dark red underskirt turns into the rug they are both standing on, and he is bleaching. This part of the installation is trying to talk about the ways women are often the ones building the bases for men and the world, and, without even knowing it, men often destroy this base. I wanted to present this violence in a way where both are being harmed by it. And the ways that men are unconscious of the ways they harm the women around them. This is why Tammy Wynette's "Stand by your Man" became a key point of inspiration for me. She articulates this awareness of being harmed in a romantic relationship, and his lack of awareness. You can hear the resignation in her voice that I see all too often. This is just the way it is, because it has happened for so many generations. There's no beginning, so there's no end.
What was the feedback of the visitors at the Freeman Space and will the installation be displayed somewhere else soon? Heather Marie Scholl: Many were quite taken with the work. In person the detail of the stitch work shines, and folks were impressed. I was pleased to see that the subtlety of the piece came through. Because of the romantic scene created, the bleach did an excellent job pointing towards the layered meaning in the work. Currently there are no solid plans to show the installation again, but I am keeping my eyes open and would be thrilled to get the chance to show the work in a new setting.
You have recently relaunched your shop - what kind of items can we find on it? Do you accept commissioned work or customized pieces? Heather Marie Scholl: The shop is a place to find limited edition pieces by me. You will be able to purchase numbered giclee prints of my embroidered wall hanging pieces, but also limited edition wearable items. For this season I have The Mermaid Choker up, each one is handmade/hand painted. I have limited the quantities, because I am constantly working on new stuff and will regularly update the shop with the latest pieces. I also have The HMS Pin, which will be a constant item. In the future, I may add other items that are restocked. Yes, I do accept commissioned and customized work and I take it on a case by case basis. My favorite is when I can be inspired by you and what you want, and you can be inspired by my voice and way of working. The flow of inspiration between me and a custom client is important! You can go directly to the store here, or get to it through my main website here.
Finnish artist and designer Kustaa Saksi is well known for his intricately colourful textiles and hypnopompic tapestries. His fans will be happy to know that, soon, they will not just admire his pieces at museum exhibitions and dedicated events in galleries, but they will be able to wear his prints and surround themselves with pieces characterised by his colourful designs. Saksi has indeed collaborated with Marimekko creating selected home and fashion pieces for the Spring/Summer 2015 season.
The choice is wide and includes home textiles, and tableware, but also jumpsuits, a light coat and practically functional dresses, all of them inspired by the colours of the ocean and underwater life, as Minna Kemell-Kutvonen, Design Director of Prints at Marimekko explains.
Saksi has a penchant for storytelling and the rich scenes with aquatic plants and animals, the Merivuokko (sea anemone) and the Meriheinä (sea grass), were directly inspired by the rhythm, colours and atmosphere of the sea floor as experienced during his scuba diving trips.
Thanks to the rich colours and to the combination of abstract and semi-abstract patterns the vegetation of the sea floor takes a new life, conjuring up soothing mindscapes made with the envigorating energy of ocean waves, swirls and turfs.
It looks like - come next Spring/Summer - it will be possible to get a taste of tropical paradises even while being stuck in the city.
How did this collaboration happen? Were you familiar with Kustaa's works for example because you saw them in an exhibition? Minna Kemell-Kutvonen: I have followed Kustaa's work for years through different exhibitions and magazines. Therefore I have been familiar with his handwriting already before our collaboration began. Some years ago, we met up with him and we both felt that it would be great to work together. Finally, as we started planning the Spring 2015 collection, we realised that the timing was right and there was a perfect slot in the visual world of Marimekko for Kustaa. Kustaa Saksi: As a Finn, I grew up with Marimekko. The company's classic shapes have always been an inspiration. It was an honour to design for them, and it was also the right time for our collaboration.
The colours in the designs are very soothing, they almost calm you down, even though there is a lot going on in the prints. What inspired the prints? Minna Kemell-Kutvonen: Working on the collection, the design team was inspired by water and the force of nature; enjoying the feeling of freedom that one can experience in the ocean and riding on top of a wave. The collection reflects the movement of water and life underwater, and brings these natural elements into the urban environment. Kustaa created his own unique interpretation of this theme. Kustaa Saksi: I've always been fascinated by the underwater world. I wanted to combine the abstraction, colour and details of these scenes for my collection with Marimekko. It's a combination of rich, detailed patterns with large solid areas as contrast. Combining aquatic, abstract and semi-abstract shapes, flora and fauna together also leaves space for the viewers' own imagination.
Kustaa, what do you like about Marimekko and Minna, what do you like about Kustaa's work? Minna Kemell-Kutvonen: Kustaa's handwriting is fascinating. It moves at the boundary of illustration, textile art and graphic design and has a very contemporary spirit. He is very good at creating interesting, fairytale-like worlds. Kustaa Saksi: Marimekko's world has a certain feeling I really like. It's a company with a history of strong women and I think they've always gone their own path, with a very contemporary aesthetic.
So far you have released both clothes and homeware with these prints, would you like to expand them on other products as well? Minna Kemell-Kutvonen: As Marimekko is a lifestyle brand with fashion, home and accessories lines, we have already incorporated these prints into our repertoire in quite a comprehensive manner.
Where can we buy these pieces? Minna Kemell-Kutvonen: The items are available at our own stores as well as through selected retailers. You can find our shop locator here.
Will the collaboration continue in the future? Minna Kemell-Kutvonen: We shall see. The collaboration has been very fruitful, so it would be a shame to stop here. Kustaa Saksi: I hope we'll have another chance for collaboration in the future. It definitely was a good date with Marimekko!
Zaha Hadid's project for Tokyo Olympic stadium sparked quite a bit of controversy and criticism from prominent Japanese architects, getting called by the eminent Arata Isozaki, a "disgrace to future generations". The main points of contention are the mammoth dimensions, its futuristic yet abstract form and location. Yet, thinking about the Japanese tradition and buildings that may bridge modern times and tradition, the mind automatically conjures up visions of Togo Murano's buildings.
Today's it's actually the thirthieth anniversary of his death, so it's worth remembering him. Born in 1891 in Karatsu, Japan, Tōgo Murano kept on working until his death and visited a construction site just a day before he died (November 26, 1984).
After his graduation in 1918 he worked as apprentice at the Kansai office of Setsu Watanabe in Osaka where he spent eleven years. In the early '20s he was sent to America and Europe: this opportunity helped him enriching his architectural vocabulary and he became interested in Nordic architecture (Saarinen's and Östberg's work, such as Stockholm City Hall, were later on echoed in Murano's Memorial Cathedral for World Peace (1954), Yonago Public Hall (1958) and the Round Library at Kansai University (1959)). In 1929 Murano opened his own office in Osaka and, twenty years later, he reorganised his office and entered into partnership with Tiuchi Mori.
Murano was accomplished in the sukiya style (see Kasuien Annex to the Miyako Hotel in Kyoto) and his work also had an Expressionist aspect. He favoured balancing Japanese traditions with Western elements, designing architecture (he completed half of his life's work after the age of seventy), and interior pieces including furniture, lighting fixtures and ornaments.
His work includes large public buildings, hotels and department stores, and the history of his career has a collebrative edge about it. The construction company involved in many of Murano's works had a team of designers and a site manager reserved for him and, while Murano's office didn't produce many design drawings prior to construction, the site manager would calculate costs based on past experience.
After the construction work began, an architect from Murano & Mori Associated Architects and Murano's team of designers from the construction company produced detailed full-scale drawings and mock-ups of building elements. Murano would then make changes, until he was satisfied (the parts with which he was less concerned were left to be designed by the construction company).
Among his most famous designs there are the Morigo Company Tokyo branch (1931), Ube City Public Hall (1937), the Memorial Cathedral for World Peace (1954), the Nishinomiya Trappist Monastery (1969) and the Yatsugatake Museum of Art. Opened in 1980 at the foot of Yatsugatake Mountain, this building consists in a continuous sequence of domes.
Though Murano was criticised and considered as a commercial architect for the volume of his work, he was respected for the relationship of cooperation between the architect and the construction company (a great lesson in collaboration) and his passion for granting top priority to the requirements of his client.
Last but not least, the most remarkable thing often noted about him is that Murano had a personal, national and era/period style, something quite unique that can't be said about many contemporary (artist), architects (and designers as well...).
In yesterday's post we looked at space, so let's go back today on earth with this biodimensional decorative pattern designed by architect and designer Otto Prutscher.
Though created between the late 1800s and the early 1900s, the pattern has an abstract space-like quality about it and makes you think about planets and the universe.
Prutscher was born in 1880 in Vienna and attended the Fachschule für Holzindustrie, entering the Kunstgewerbeschule (School of Applied Arts) in Vienna in 1897, where he studied with Franz von Matsch and Josef Hoffmann. He was strongly influenced by the latter (his early designs borrowed from the Jugendstil style developed by Hoffmann) and by the Secessionist style.
After he finished his studies in 1901, Prutscher focused on designing both buildings and interiors. He designed with Erwin Puchinger interiors in Paris and London, while he also worked on numerous houses and interiors in Vienna and in the provinces.
From 1908 his designs started reflecting an influence of classical forms as shown in the work of this period best exemplified by the marble room created for the Kunstschau in Vienna, executed by craftsworkers of the Wiener Werkstätte.
Prutscher also worked as assistant at the Graphische Lehr-und Versuchsanstalt and, from 1909 at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Vienna (where he taught until 1946).
Architecture-wise after World War I he mainly focused on public housing complexes combining elements of Expressionism and Neue Sachlichkeit, though he was very much into design and the idea of the Gesamtkunstwerk, that is the passion for creating a total environment. This is why he created a wide range of objects – furniture, textiles, jewellery, clocks, glass and ceramic pieces, and leather goods – all of them inspired by art.
He designed for the Wiener Werkstätte, the Deutsche Werkstätten, Augarten, Bakalowits, Chwala, Lobmeyr, Lötz Witwe, Thonet, Ludwig, J.&.J. Hermann, Backhausen, Herburger & Rhomberg and many more.
He also took part in several exhibitions and events, among them the World Exhibition in Paris (1900), the Exhibition for Applied Arts Turin (1902), the Winter-exhibition at the Museum for Art and Industry in Vienna (1911/12) and the Exhibition for Tapestry (1913).
Austria will have a high fashion moment next week as Chanel will host its 2014/15 Métiers d'art collection at the Hotel Schloss Leopoldskron in Salzburg, on 2nd December.
The event is anticipated by a video directed by Karl Lagerfeld entitled "Reincarnation" starring Pharrell Williams and Cara Delevingne as Emperor Franz Joseph I and his wife Elisabeth of Austria (imagine trying to re-do the romantic image of the trilogy of films about Elisabeth directed by Ernst Marischka and starring Romy Schneider in a trashy pop way and you get the final idea...), accompanied by the soundtrack "CC The World," by Williams himself (a track that hides a pun in its title - the logo of the fashion house and the nickname of Elisabeth, Sisi). Though Lagerfeld is very much into art, considering this anticipation and the popular "icons" involved in the video, it is unlikely the designer will be using references such as Otto Prutscher in the collection. We'll discover more in a week, in the meantime, rediscovering or getting to know Prutscher, his architectures and designs, may not be such a bad idea.
Frau in Mond (Woman in the Moon, 1929) by Fritz Lang has been recently restored and re-issued on DVD and Blu-ray by Eureka! This new version is quite interesting since it is accompanied by the documentary "The First Scientific Science-Fiction Film", directed by Gabriele Jacobi and explaining the making of the film.
Lang was inspired by the 1923 book The Rocket into Interplanetary Space by Hermann Oberth (also the film's scientific adviser) that tackled the problems of early space travel.
The adventurous story follows the vicissitudes of Helius, a German entrepreneur, who decides to embark on a journey to the moon to fulfil the dreams of the elderly scientist Professor Manfeldt. Helius leaves with rival Windegger, Friede, the woman both men love, Manfeldt and blackmailer Turner, though during their journey they discover a surprising stowaway on the ship, a young boy obsessed with sci-fi comics. Once they land, the crew will discover that surviving is much more important than discovering the gold Manfeldt claims can be found on the moon, while a dramatic choice awaits them towards the end of the film.
Taken from the eponymous novel by Lang's wife Thea von Harbou, Woman in the Moon is a mix of scientific discovery, melodrama and sci-fi fiction.
The film re-release seems well-timed with what's happening in the news and I'm referring not just to the recent achievements of the Rosetta mission.
The Soyuz spacecraft, launched from Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan yesterday, landed indeed on the International Space Station this morning, delivering Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti and her crewmates Russian Soyuz commander Anton Shkaplerov and NASA astronaut Terry Virts to the weightless research centre where they will live and work for five months.
Cristoforetti is flying as an ESA astronaut for Italy's ASI space agency under a special agreement between ASI and NASA. Her mission is named "Futura" to highlight the science and technology research she will run in weightlessness to help shape our future. In her mission she will also be using the POP3D Portable On-Board Printer, Europe's very first 3D printer in space.
While in Cristoforetti's case we should be talking about "woman on a space station", rather than about "woman in the moon", both her mission and Friede's (in the film) seem to have the same aims. Friede is a symbolical "Eve on the moon", a sort of hope in a future destiny; Cristoforetti's mission is about research, discovery, science, technology and exploration,but also about adventures and dreams of the future (besides female astronauts embarked on a mission seem to be the perfect answer to the rather embarrassing sexist and terribly inappropriate shirt - surely a case of "call the fashion space police" View this photo- donned by the Rosetta project scientist Matt Taylor during a European Space Agency live stream...).
You can keep updated with Cristoforetti's mission online by visiting this site, reading the mission blog Outpost 42 or following her on Twitter @astro_samantha. Hopefully, in the next few months, she will inspire us to look at space, technology, women and - why not - also art, fiction, cinema and fashion, from a scientific and intriguing point of view.
As a follow-up to yesterday's post, let's look more at some of the twenty-eight large concrete panel systems/buildings developed and disseminated between 1931 and 1981 and recreated via the 3D printed models on display on one wall in the Chile Pavilion at the 14th Venice International Architecture Biennale (until tomorrow, 23rd November 2014).
Brecast was a system developed in the '60s by the British Research Station (now the Building Research Establishment, BRE) under the direction of Nares Craig to be exported to developing countries to improve living conditions and tackle the housing shortage problem.
Designed to allow flexibility in the building typology, Brecast was officially launched in 1972 attracting the attention of many different clients from numerous countries. In 1973 the Chilean Ministry of Housing applied for UK aid and for the supply of a Brecast package of equipment and expertise for the construction of 400 flats in Santiago. A demonstration model of Brecast was showcased in the same year in Santiago; Nares Craig also managed to meet Salvador Allende weeks before the Pinochet coup.
James Stirling's St Andrew's Dormitory is instead a perfect example of a bold structure built with prefabricated elements.
The building is characterised by a series of panels and sections intriguingly jointing in a corner and therefore giving the structure a sculptural shape.
Burov House is equally inspiring: built in 1939 by architects B. Blokhin and Andrei K. Burov, the house is situated at 27 Lenungradisky Prospekt, Moscow, and it is structured through prefabricated reinforced concrete blocks but it is ornamented in a Renaissance style.
Though the concept of the (prefabricated) panel belongs to architecture, it is easy to see it applied to other fields such as fashion. The Chilean pavilion curators carried out their research on panels over seven years, while it would be intriguing to develop something quicker in fashion, such as one fashion collection maybe based around a fabric panel. Anybody up for the challenge?
Upon stepping into the Chile Pavilion at the 14th Venice International Architecture Biennale (until 23rd November 2014), visitors are welcomed by a domestic environment. This small flat complete with kitsch dolls and trinkets is a replica of Silvia Gutiérrez's apartment in Viña del Mar, built with the KPD panel system.
Inside the main room a solitary panel produced in 1972 by an industry donated to Chile by the Soviet Union stands in the upright position, like the mysterious monolith out of Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Through it and with the help of twenty-eight large concrete panel systems developed and disseminated between 1931 and 1981 and recreated via the 3D printed models on display on one wall, curators Pedro Alonso and Hugo Palmarola tell the fascinating story of the KPD (Russian: krupnopanelnoye domostroyenie) system and of the political and social meanings behind it.
The pavilion curators spent roughly 7 years researching this essential element of modern architecture that is also the subject of many political controversies. Salvador Allende signed it up in the wet concrete; the signature was covered up by Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship and representations of the Virgin and Child between two colonial style lamp fixtures were also added. The extensive research was totally worth it as Chile got a well-deserved Silver Lion for revealing through this project "a critical chapter of the history of global circulation of modernity."
Getting an award at the end of a research is always an unexpected bonus, how did you feel when the Chile Pavilion got the Silver Lion at the 14th Venice Architecture Biennale? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: Even though we felt the Pavilion was well received by the many newspapers, magazines and online sites that listed it as one of the things to see at the Biennale, you're right, it was totally unexpected, also considering that we were obviously not doing the pavilion in order to get a prize. The pavilion is indeed part of a research that I've been doing with my colleague and co-curator Hugo Palmarola over the last six or seven years. For us it was already fantastic to have the opportunity to conclude our research curating the pavilion, but getting the Silver Lion was a real added bonus and made us really happy.
Your approach seemed to go well with other installations: you focused for example on a concrete panel, while Rem Koolhaas divided the main exhibition at the Central Pavilion of the Giardini into different sections. What prompted you to respond to the original brief for the Biennale with a concrete wall? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: Through our installation we were actually responding to the question on the absorption of modernity from within, using one of the elements of architecture - a panel. So the Chile Pavilion is suspended between the "Absorbing Modernity" brief and the idea of Koolhaas' Elements of Architecture.
Who is the main protagonist of the absorbing modernity process, the architects or the people living in their designs? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: What we've been trying to propose through the Chilean Pavilion is that it's not actually architects who absorb modernity, those who absorb it are the people and the workers. We have tried to tell the story from their point of view and, in particular, from the point of view of the workers. They were the most important part of the story as they were connected with aspects of prefabrication and transformation of the world from within the universal army of proletarian collective work.
What inspired you to originally start this research focused on the humble concrete panel with Hugo Palmarola? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: The starting point that we found really interesting was the presence in Chile of buildings made with elements made in Soviet factories. Those buildings and the factories were never investigated in Chile, even if you could find literature, it was not really scholarly work on the topic. After we realised the panels were made in a factory donated by the Soviet Union to Chile in the '70s, we also found out that the same factory had been donated in the '60s to Cuba, so there was a story of globalisation and of Cold War and the relationship between architecture and politics, because in Cuba it happened right after the Missile Crisis so Khrushchev gave the factory to Fidel Castro and a few years later Brezhnev gave the factory to Allende. Our research started in Chile, but it took us to Cuba and Russia; it took quite a long time to really put forward all the different components we were interested in this history of architecture that goes beyond Chile, and has a global edge about it.
Why do you think there were never any publications about this story? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: There are a couple of reasons, one of them is political. You have to keep in mind that in Chile Augusto Pinochet was still alive and playing a role in politics, so up to the mid-'90s it was a bit of a taboo to try and deal with or dig into issues linked to Russia or the Soviet Union, especially just after the end of the dictatorship. The other reason is more linked to the discipline of architecture: we tend to think about the history of architecture as the history of individual architects who give a great contribution to the discipline from within the design of buildings. If you consider things from this perspective, the whole point of talking about industries, prefabrication, and buildings that are considered as ugly and repetitive and are not considered as architecture as they are not designed by individual architects, is neglected and marginal compared to the official canon of the history of architecture. These two things combine in explaining very well why something like this was never treated critically. Recent works published about modern architecture in Cuba talk about buildings, but not about the large panel systems behind them which means that for historians or critics, those buildings are not even to be considered as architecture and that makes them a blind spot for historiography and for us an ideal scenario to start dealing with issues that we consider all the way relevant and important for the architectural discipline.
Was it challenging also to recreate the 3D printed models that form a sort of architectural encyclopedia of panels? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: I teach at the Catholic University in Santiago so I've been running a research unit and workshop for the last three years there. Each student in the course has been studying one system and this resulted in an engaging research and pedagogic project for them. Students were assigned one system and they were asked how was it made, if they were able to find evidence, drawings, photographs and so on. It was challenging, but they recreated all the 28 systems to the point that we managed to re-articulate them panel by panel.
The Pavilion has also got an artistic twist thanks to the photographic section focusing on the workers, how did you come across it? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: The photographs pertaining to the workers were taken by photographer Nolberto Salinas and we were lucky we found him. He was super-generous in allowing us to use the photographs because he was the official photographer for the factory since the beginning and he managed to keep on being the official photographer after the coup and during the dictatorship, so he had the register of the factory since it arrived in Chile until the late 1970s. He is still alive and we invited him to Venice, so he was with us when the Pavilion opened. From the curatorial point of view we were super happy that we weren't curating materials that were already well known by people, but we transformed Nolberto Salinas into the resident artist of the pavilion, discovering his work and placing his photographs at the centre of the debate as well.
Did the monolith in Kubrick's film 2001: A Space Odyssey come to your mind while putting together this installation? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: I'm glad you were able to spot this connection. We're happy if visitors can read this connection, as we were certainly not proposing a mini-museum with this pavilion, but a fluid and aesthetic visual manner to present the materials with a cinematic twist. We had many discussions about how to call the pavilion and we knew that "Panel" wasn't going to be exhaustive, also because the panel under Allende was no longer a panel, but he transformed it into a monument, so we started looking for terms and ideas that could encompass the wider history of this element. The idea of the monolith comes from a reflection that takes Kubrick's monolith into account. In the film the monolith is a sort of alien intelligence that gives monkeys the possibility to become men, while the arrival of the panel in Chile meant that a new technology became available.
What's the future of your fascinating research? Pedro Ignacio Alonso: The Pavilion marks the conclusion of a long-standing research that Hugo Palmarola and I carried out. We have been working for the last few years on a book - Panel - that was published in June by the Architectural Association and that was accompanied by an exhibition that was on in London between May and June 2014. The Biennale was a fantastic way to conclude our research, though it doesn't mean that we're not going to keep working out along these lines. We are very interested in architecture and cinema and in particular in Cuban cinema and in architecture through cinema in a place like Cuba, where we have the possibility to go and the contacts to do more researches. We're also dealing with other infrastructures that were made by Russians in Chile in the '50s and '60s and, you never know at which points some of the threads that were examined in the Pavilion in Venice can continue developing in different manners.
Image credits for this post
1, 3, 4, 5 Photographs by Gonzalo Puga
2. Mrs. Silvia Gutierrez’s Appartment by Felipe Aravena
Yesterday's post began with a simple statement - "Modernity started out as a promise" - and analysed the impact and consequences of modernity in architecture. In the post we looked at how utopian modernity turned into a disturbing dystopia, but, in many ways, the same thing could be stated about modernity in fashion.
Throughout the decades, the relentless search for modernity resulted in a loss of decency, comfort, functionality, practicality, genuine innovation, basic aesthetic values and high quality materials.
Sure, comfort and function are not always high on the fashion scales, and if Miuccia says she's into "ugly chic" thousands of superficial people will follow her forgetting what the words "good taste" mean. Yet the question "what were they thinking?" naturally comes to your mind when you see useless (mind you, not "uselessly surreal", just "ugly useless") accessories like some of the ones for the Spring/Summer 2015 season.
A recent selection on WWD was particular fascinating since it could have been perfectly described by the sentence "Modernity started out as a promise...but ended up in a mess". Indeed, designers interpreting modernity offer us for the next Spring/Summer season a wide range of accessories, characterised by weird shapes, crazy angles and an anti-functionalist charm.
One main technique for a few designers consisted in taking a pair of shoes and gluing to them a terrible heel that could go from angular and squarish (but supposedly architectural; such as in Pierre Hardy's case) to Mammoth-leg like (see JW Anderson's).
Another trend is creating terribly unbalanced footwear: Prada came up with massive platform shoes in '70s style with a tiny ankle strap of the kind that will definitely break on the very first day you'll wear them; Salvatore Ferragamo took one of its most iconic shoe, the rainbow platform sandal created in the '30s for Judy Garland, and managed to turn it into a horrifying all black version with a strap that passes in-between-the-toes (is that isolating tape you put it around the toes, by the way?).
The label founder Salvatore studied orthopedics, but whoever came up with these shoes didn't as pain is guaranteed by the high platform that doesn't allow the foot to bend without causing pain in between the toes.
You can file under the "orthopedically questionable category" also Stuart Weitzeman's sandals with golden platform (though Barbarella would wear them...) and, above all, the most ugly pair of shoes I have ever seen in my life, Tom Ford's massive sandals. Their ugliness is indeed too difficult to describe. Just horrid.
Hybrid shoes are also very popular for the next Spring/Summer 2015 season: Givenchy has found the equivalent of a straitjacket for your feet and legs, a schizoid boot-cum-sandal with a wedge that ends with an aesthetically displeasing spiky metal heel (are they sold with a slave that can help you putting them on?).
A nostalgia for the late '80s probably prompted Marco De Vincenzo to glue a pastel coloured Charro boot to a pair of high heels with terribly puzzling results; Marni also had a nostalgic moment, but for the '90s when Buffalo Boots were terribly in. In the late '90s Buffalo came up with quite high platform sandals that caused more than just one accident in the streets of London. Now you can have a similar version designed by Marni, that will allow you to have/cause more accidents, albeit in an innovatively stylish yet sporty way.
One honourable mention for the hybrid category goes to Marc Jacobs's Dr Scholl's velvet sandals The good thing about Dr Scholl's wooden sandals is that, being made with wood you can cover them in water and sand and they will still dry without the wood cracking or they could be used for violently engaging fights with an annoying partner/neighbour/family member/stalker and so on.Now, the velvet material strips them of their main purposes: getting messy on the beach, in the garden or in the shower, and, above all, strips them of their violent connotation, which, allow me to say, is rather annoying. What do you throw at somebody boring you in summer, an expensive velvet imitation of a Dr Scholl's sandal? Let's face it, it just wouldn't work. What you saying? This is supposed to be filed under evening wear being velvety and covered in Swarovski? Say what you want, but this is just a glamorised Dr Scholl's sandal.
Talking about categories, how can you resist accessories that can be filed as "shoes and bags with multiple purposes"? Rochas's shoes covered in super-fluffy feathers can be used to sweep floors while walking, which saves you time if you're a busy woman (you can easily imagine Anna Wintour cleaning in them...).
Having been assembled with sneaker leftovers, Alexander Wang's bags can instead be dismantled and reconfigured again into a pair of sneakers. They should sell them with a label that says "For all your fitness needs" or "Improves your manual skills".
But the world of accessories offers endless and fun possibilities (especially if you're a comedians...): think about the gigantic necklace by Narciso Rodriguez that is unfortunately not sold with elastic therapeutic tape that could help ease pain around your neck area after wearing it; Kenzo's visor with an enhanced and elongated forehead area, ideal if you are a Klingon and have a large rigged forehead to protect from UVA rays; and Fendi's Karl Lagerfeld shrunken head - pardon - bag.
Theres is also a vast "art for art's sake" sub-category when it comes to accessories, among the various examples we can remember Sara Battaglia's (the living proof that, yes, having a relative who is also a fashion editor, does help in this industry...) manga -inspired bags, that actually make you wonder if somebody high on acid designed and coloured them in with cheap DIY materials while watching disturbing horror films.
In the same category, you can also file Dries van Noten's horse fur bag that evokes disturbing visions of Méret Elisabeth Oppenheim's Object (Le Déjeuner en fourrure).
In between colourful and fun ideas, you suddenly realise that fashion is verging towards the ridiculous, unfunctional, impractical or simply horrid while a passion for the extremes – higher and higher, smaller and smaller, gigantic and visually striking or gravity defying (like Alexander McQueen's sandals...) – is favoured.So let's go back to the beginning and the initial question "Modernity: Promise or Menace?" You can try and find your answer when you see these pieces in the stores and maybe even try them on to get a better design perspective on modernity. In the meantime, to conclude this post we can add that it is clear that the covetable and desirable is slowly turning into a design nightmare that verges towards the ridiculous. But maybe architect Frank Gehry has a better answer.
Last month, when a journalist raised some criticisms at a press conference in Spain, Gehry gave the finger and added "Ninety-eight per cent of everything that is built today is pure shit. There's no sense of design, no respect for humanity or for anything else. They are damn buildings and that's it." It's just damn fashion then, with no sense of design or proportions. In a nutshell, just pure shit.
