ARCHITECTURAL REVIEW

08 July, 2014

The Swiss Pavilion at 14th Biennale di Venezia

Lorenza Baroncelli talked at GreekArchitects.gr about the Swiss proposal at the 14th International Architecture Exhibition

by Gratv

Greek version

At the 14th international architecture exhibition in venice, the swiss pavilion presents ‘lucius burckhardt and cedric price - a stroll through a fun palace'.

Curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist.In collaboration with Herzog & de Meuron, Atelier Bow-Wow, Agnès b., Lorenza Baroncelli, Stefano Boeri, Eleanor Bron, Elizabeth Diller, Olafur Eliasson, Liam Gillick, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Dan Graham, Dorothea von Hantelmann, Samantha Hardingham, Carsten Höller, Koo Jeong-a, Philippe Parreno, Asad Raza, Tino Sehgal, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Mirko Zardini, and others.

In a digital time of unlimited access to information, where everyone can be an architect, a curator, an intellectual thinker, Hans Ulrich Obrist’s Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price – A stroll through a fun palace revisits the recent past of architecture through retrospectives of Lucius Burckhardt (1925–2003) and Cedric Price (1934–2003), reflecting on its future in the 21st century.

‘We often invent the future with elements from the past. Lucius Burckhardt (1925–2003) and Cedric Price (1934–2003) were two great visionaries whose work resonates and inspires new generations in the 21st century. At the core of both their work is a practice of drawing. At the centre of the project will be the archives of drawings of Cedric and Lucius, of which different aspects will be revealed throughout the Biennale. ‘A stroll through a fun palace’ in collaboration with architects and artists will present a laboratory where the ideas of Cedric and Lucius can be toolboxes to invent the future.’ (Hans Ulrich Obrist, February 2014)

Pavillon of Switzerland at the 14th International Architecture Exhibition, "Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price
A stroll through a fun palace" curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist © Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia

Cedric Price.Fun Palace: Interior perspective 1964 black and white ink over gelatin silver print12.6 x 24.8 cm
DR1995:0188:518Cedric Price fonds, Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montréal

Both Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price are regarded as among the most visionary thinkers of the 20th century, redefining architecture as revolving around people, space and performance. 2/5 Lucius Burckhardt was a Swiss political economist, sociologist, art historian and planning theorist, known as founding father of ‘strollology’ – his science of the walk. He pioneered an interdisciplinary analysis of man-made environments, discussing both the visible and invisible aspects of our cities, landscapes, political processes and social relations, as well as the long-term effects of design and planning decisions. Cedric Price was guided by a fundamental belief that architecture must ‘enable people to think the unthinkable’.

His project Fun Palace (1960–61), conceived as a ‘laboratory of fun’ and ‘university of the streets’, though never realised, established him as one of the UK’s most innovative and thought-provoking architects. Both Burckhardt and Price critiqued the traditional tertiary education system and were interested in rethinking the basic concept of a university.

Following their revolutionary teaching methods, Obrist's Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price – A stroll through a fun palace radically re-approaches the idea of the national pavilion, reconceiving it as a site for cross-disciplinary, interactive, international engagement. Acknowledging that it is not possible to present the complex practices of Burckhardt and Price through a static display of drawings, Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price – A stroll through a fun palace aims for visitors to encounter the architects’ archives performatively. The display on Lucius Burckhardt is co-curated by architects Herzog & de Meuron, in collaboration with the Lucius & Annemarie Burckhardt Foundation and Martin Schmitz Verlag, whilst the temporary archive of Cedric Price is co-curated by Mirko Zardini, director of the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA)

To present the temporary archives, Herzog & de Meuron have devised a site-specific system located in the graphic room of the Swiss Pavilion, aiming to create a new system of knowledge and ideas. Visible through the glass walls but not accessible to the public, it is to be conceived as an object on display.

‘As former students of Lucius Burckhardt, we were very happy to accept Hans Ulrich Obrist’s invitation to contribute to this small Biennale project – the longer we worked on it and thought about it, the less “physical” the exhibition concept became, so that, in the end, only Lucius’s and Cedric’s mental universe were floating in space.’ (Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, February 2014)

The idea of an architecture that could take account of time was of central importance to both Price and Burckhardt’s practices, and the exhibition will reflect this aspect of their work. The space will be programmed according to a time-based dramaturgy, creating a changing mise-en-scène and an exhibition in constant motion. As the invention of new institutional forms was essential to Price and Burckhardt, the exhibition will also theoretically reflect on this endeavor.

Lucius Burckhardt, 1977, Photo: Annemarie Burckhardt

Lucius Burckhardt, Autofahrerspaziergang, Kassel 1993, Seminar Wahrnehmung und Verkehr Photo: Bertram Weisshaar

The opening days will feature a series of discussions on architecture, landscape design and modes of display. Several times a day Dorothea von Hantelmann will present vignettes on the past, present and future function of art institutions. The exhibition will also include contributions by Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Philippe Parreno, Asad Raza and Tino Sehgal, whilst other contemporary artists and architects, such as Dan Graham, Liam Gillick and Koo Jeong-a, will present their homages to Burckhardt and Price. 3/5 Following Burckhardt’s and Price’s critique of the traditional university system, Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price – A stroll through a fun palace will function as an architectural school under the leadership of Italian architect Stefano Boeri with Lorenza Baroncelli. It will welcome and connect students in a worldwide network of thinkers, schools and researchers, enabling them to reflect on how the contemporary landscape is changing.

This network will produce a digital daily and a weekly print magazine titled The Tomorrow. Invited by Hans Ulrich Obrist, Japanese architects Atelier Bow-Wow echoed the idea of Price's Fun Palace with a strong visual intervention above the entrance to the Swiss Pavilion. Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price – A stroll through a fun palace was anticipated by the exhibition Lucius Burckhardt Exhibition and educational program for the Swiss Pavilion at the Architecture Biennale 2014 and a series of seminars on Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price, which took place from 13 March to 11 April 2014 at the Institute for the History and Theory of Architecture (gta) at the ETH Zurich. These were be presented by gta Exhibitions in collaboration with Herzog & de Meuron, the Lucius & Annemarie Burckhardt Foundation, the Canadian Centre for Architecture and Samantha Hardingham. Lucius Burckhardt and Cedric Price – A stroll through a fun palace is accompanied by a publication by NORM designers, Zurich.