The Art of Combat: The Fight Over Museums and Cities

The spindly legs of a Louise Bourgeois spider sculpture, seen above in this rendering, show us that giants only need a small footprint to stand.

The rendering depicts one of the six projects that’s been shortlisted as a candidate for the Guggenheim’s new museum in the Finnish capital of Helsinki. The Guggenheim, like the MoMA, is a giant of the modern art world: it commands extensive collections, curatorial expertise, and name recognition. However, the global institution’s newest Scandinavian venture is not a fait accompli: despite the success of its famous Gehry-designed museum in Biblao, Finland is balking at the proposed project’s $150m construction bill. The critical question is whether such sacrifices will produce significant returns in terms of tourism revenue and cultural cache. Many Finns disagree and resistance has coalesced around a rival architectural competition, titled the Next Helsinki, which is waging a war of ideas against the Guggenheim. At stake is the future of the Helsinki waterfront and a major chapter in the history of museum giants. I interviewed Michael Sorkin, chairperson of the rival competition, on the Guggenheim’s six finalists and the future of museums.

Link to the Article

For more on the artist Louise Bourgeois (a favorite of mine), check out her profile on Artsy.

Top Image: Finalist: GH-04380895. Image Courtesy of Malcolm Reading Consultants, via Archdaily.

Personal vs. Professional: Architecture’s Moral Code in Dispute

Architect Zaha Hadid famously stated that investigating the deaths of some 800+ construction workers was not her “duty as an architect.”

This, understandably, touched off a firestorm of debate. Hadid’s firm was (and still is) designing a major stadium as part of Qatar’s 2022 World Cup Games. Construction practices in Gulf countries such as Qatar are notoriously bad: employers confiscate workers’ passports, force them to work in in dangerous conditions, and pay them little. This practice even has a name: the kafala system. Hadid was sympathetic to the construction workers but pointed out that their safety was purely the responsibility of the government. Was she right?

Technically, she was completely in the right. Architects are empowered to oversee quality of construction, not workplace safety. While anyone visiting a construction site can and should report abuses to authorities, such responsibilities are nowhere in the architect’s contract with their client. Workplace safety laws typically hold the construction companies responsible. That being said, on a fundamental human level, we can never check our moral compass at the door. Hadid and scores of other architects have designed buildings in a region known to mistreat, harm, and kill workers. Conversely, architecture is a fundamentally social activity where architects must cooperate with each other, with other business entities, and with government actors. So where does one set of beliefs and professional ethics begin? Is the architecture a vehicle for an architect’s ideals or simply a job?

The question is immeasurably complex. However, your gut reaction will greatly affect your view of recent events at the AIA (American Institute of Architects). The AIA is the United States’ premier professional architectural association, representing more than eighty thousand American architects. My recent Architectural Record article discusses a human rights amendment to their code of ethics and why the AIA was rejected it. Read on to see how conviction and profession can clash.

Link to the Article

Top Image: Eleanor Roosevelt with the first printing of the Universal Declaration of Human rights, via google plus.

No Easy Answers On The Open Office

Distracting or relaxing? Demotivating or energizing? Healthy or unhealthy?

No one can seem to make up their mind about the open office. One year ago, an article from the New Yorker decried the negative effects of the open office. It reduces productivity, it causes workers to get more sick, it’s noisy and distracting – the list goes on. However, I recently interviewed the designers of a seemingly open office for Airbnb’s customer experience (CX) call center in Portland. First and foremost, they’ve tackled the noise problem with some ingenious architectural countermeasures such as a sound-dampening ceiling. The design also offers privacy when employees want it: individual desks and tiny “duck-ins” allow customer service agents to shut out the world when necessary. Other fun concepts, such as an employee-designed “team mantles,” have kept the space fresh and engaging.

I haven’t visited the office personally but the designers claim Airbnb’s employees love it. Perhaps this isn’t so much an “open office” but one simply well-designed to meet the needs of its users. The designers undertook an extensive research phase that helped them address the strengths and errors of the CX agents’ previous offices. When it comes to unique designs such as these, I’m reminded that the best design writing doesn’t quickly categorize and label a building, but rather demonstrates what makes it different and useful to understand.

Link to the Article

Top Image: Airbnb’s Customer Experience Office in Portland. Photo credit Jeremy Bittermann.

When Art Became Digital

Barbara Nessim was the last person I’d expect to be a trailblazer. The famed professional illustrator was immeasurably friendly as she led me on a tour of her retrospective exhibition at the Bard Graduate Center, on display until January 11th. Usually those individuals at the cutting edge, especially in art and architecture, have a subtle aggressive or tactical air, some trait that has enabled them to beat out the rest. In contrast, the still-energetic 76 year-old Nessim led a successful career as a freelance illustrator when few women were professionals.

More impressively, she was an early adopter of graphics software for art, something most artists take for granted in an Abode-drive world. During the tour, it seemed her digital forays were spurred by pure curiosity and the desire to try new things, an urge also seen in her explorations into fashion, sculpture, and book design. She told me that, “even on my deathbed – wait, wait, one more thing to do!”

The decades of her work, on display at the Bard Graduate Center, evinces how she used her personal artistic explorations to explore new styles and ideas that would quickly appear in her public and professional works. As someone who toes the line between my passion for writing and the profession of journalism, Nessim’s successful balancing act spoke to me deeply, but this collection is impressive by anyone’s standards.

Link to the Article

Top Image: Barbara Nessim. John Lennon Remembered, for the October 20, 1988 cover of Rolling Stone, 1988. Gouache. Victoria & Albert Museum, E.63-2013.

PS. For those interested in even earlier digital art, see Douglas Dodd’s book on the subject. Dodd, who expertly curated the exhibition, also led my tour with Nessim.

(Blog Exclusive) Grappling with the Past and Present: Artist Miya Ando

On December 14th, Japan moved one step closed to taking up the sword.

After World War II, the Japanese government wrote a “Peace Clause” into its constitution that forswore a military and the use of force abroad. However, now faced with the rising power of China, some Japanese wish to reassert the martial potential of the world’s 3rd largest economy and 10th largest population. A recent election affirmed the aspirations of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to reinterpret the clause and expand the Japanese military. Now, a new generation of Japanese will soon grapple with two very different ideas of itself: a peaceful and international post-war Japan and a longer martial history that stretches from Imperial Japan to the samurai. As Japan shapes a new identity, one artist has already spent her life exploring her modern identity through her links to Japan’s identity, spiritualism, and history: Miya Ando.

Half-white and half-Japanese, from a clan of swordsmiths-turned-Buddhist priests, Ando’s complex background shapes her metal paintings and sculptures. With five solo shows this past year, and another set to open January 17th, Ando is keeping very busy. I sat down with the artist in her Long Island City studio to discuss the many currents of thought churning beneath her serene titanium, steel and aluminum works.

Top: One of Ando’s Kimonos. Image courtesy of Miya Ando and Sundaram Tagore Gallery.

Saving the Early History of Digital Architecture

40 years ago, not a single architectural drawing was done digitally. Now there is an entire industry of software-makers catering to the needs of architecture. In between now and then, however, architects were forced to make novel digital tools that remain unknown to the public and to the architectural profession.

Architect Greg Lynn has been involved with computer design since the 80s when he embraced the use of digital and mathematical tools to shape his projects. How architects use these tools has always been a contentious subject: do you let a tool, such as a computer script or complex formula, determine a design? Regardless of how you view Lynn’s biomorphic work, I sat down to discuss another one of his projects: a massive effort with the Canadian Center of Architectur that aims to preserve the early history of digital architectural tools. With the second of three exhibitions now open at Yale, now’s the time to familiarize yourself with this little-known chapter of digital design.

Link to the Article

Top Image: Greg Lynn by David Lai, Hello Design

Strength in Diversity: MoMA PS1’s Young Architecture Program Finalists

Having read more architecture books than I would care to admit, I can say it’s impossible to give architecture a single, concise definition.

It’s one of the many things that makes the architectural field so enriching and exciting: it can host so many varied perspectives. I was pleased to see that diversity in this year’s five finalists for the MoMA P.S.1 Young Architects’ Program. Started in 1999, the program allows a recently-founded firm (or even an independent architect) to design a structure within MoMA P.S.1’s courtyard in New York City. This year’s five finalists run the gamut: from Andrés Jaque and his socially-conscious architecture to Bittertang’s earthy and environmental designs to Erin Besler’s critique of the architectural giant Peter Eisenman (don’t miss her Wes Anderson-styled thesis video). Read on to get to know each finalist.

Link to the Article

Incidentally, the Buru Buru amphitheater (seen above), designed by Bittertang, will be an earthy cave with grass sprouting along its roof. The theater was recently completed and its soil is still in tubes that will eventually decay and give way to a green landscape.

Top Image: Buru Buru amphitheater (2014) by Bittertang, Image courtesy Bittertang

The Military’s Latest Architectural Tool

Military commanders and architects are, in one key respect, on the opposite ends of the same spectrum.

Some have said that warfare is all about creating and destroying infrastructure: all the systems that make the opponent’s civilization function. This means bridges, power plants, airports, communications, etc. An army may destroy a bridge over a river only to see its opponents rapidly construct a pontoon bridge replacement.

While this is a very narrow way of looking at war, it certainly holds some truth. Where do architects fit in? Architecture is the final link of the infrastructure chain: buildings plug into all the all the water, electricity, transportation, food, and communications systems we operate. While an architect figures out how a building will fulfill social, economic, and cultural functions, a general will figure out how to most rapidly destroy or protect the infrastructure underneath it.

I’m always reminded of this dichotomy whenever I see a military tool with immediate architectural applications. Both architects and generals benefit from rapidly understanding a landscape, whether its for battles or buildings. The U.S. Army recently revealed its ARES prototype, an augmented reality tool that can rapidly digitize and visualize a miniature landscape. Read on to see what architects could do with this tool and how it highlights the difference between an architect and a general.

Link to the Article

Top Image: The ARES, via youtube.

The Hidden Health Dangers of Interiors and Furniture

The list of side effects, including cancer and diabetes, reminded me of leaded gas or ozone-destroying chlorofluorocarbons. This was another quick embrace of a chemical solution that may be disastrous in the long term. The chemical in question, however, can be found indoors thanks to its common presence in architectural materials.

The problem lies in flame retardants, a range of chemicals placed in architectural materials to satisfy fire-resistance tests. These tests have gone a long way to saving lives but now, it seems, the chemical presence they encourage indoors may be just as dangerous. We’re learning that the flame retardants don’t stay locked within materials and accumulate within the human body. Suzanne Drake, a senior interior designer and associate at the international firm Perkins+Will, coauthored a white paper with a chemistry PhD to communicate the possible dangers. As she said at the end of the interview, “We have sprinkler systems for fires that occur once in a blue moon—meanwhile, I’m being exposed to these chemicals every day for years on end. Which is more dangerous?” Read on to find out more.

Link to the Article

Top Image: via Chicago Tribune. Read the Chicago Tribune’s article on how the chemical industry is fighting efforts to reduce flame retardants here.

Smithsonian Redux

There’s no better client for architects than large institutions: stable and enduring, they have the resources and motivation to make good buildings that will last. However, with a vast network of donors, stakeholders, and regulations, they can present difficult waters to navigate.

The recent unveiling of BIG‘s redesign of the Smithsonian South Campus, located on the Washington D.C. Mall, is an excellent example of how architects can best perform in institutional projects. Tasked with reinvigorating the Smithsonian’s neglected seven museums and galleries, the BIG took a slow, deliberate, and sensitive approach to the design. The payoff is tangible: not only is the project well-reasoned and thoughtful, it has so far navigated the many levels of government and internal museum review. Read on to see details of the $2 billion project!

Link to the Article

Top Image, Rendering of the Smithsonian South Campus at Night, Courtesy the Smithsonian