For the month of October I am here in Venice working in the British Pavilion at the Architecture Biennale. For those of you who don’t know about the British proposal for David Chipperfield’s Common Ground theme, here are a few words and photos. As you can probably tell I’ve kept this post pretty impartial…
Here’s what the British Council say:
The British Pavilion at the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale presents the work of ten architectural teams that have travelled the world in search of imaginative responses to universal issues. Venice Takeaway charts their course in Argentina, Brazil, China, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Russia, Thailand and the USA and demonstrates the creative potential of sharing ideas across borders.
Research, in the form of photography, drawing, film and objects will be displayed in a Research Emporium, while in the galleries of the pavilion you will find Takeaway Proposals – installations and objects that encapsulate their ideas for change.
Commissioned by the British Council and curated by Vanessa Norwood and Vicky Richardson, Venice Takeaway responds to Venice Biennale Director David Chipperfield’s theme of Common Ground by identifying new ways to negotiate the challenges of making architecture and making the case for internationalism.
The exhibition is a reminder that the practice of architecture is as much about observation and thinking as it is about design. We have taken inspiration from Albert Einstein who said, ‘If we knew what we were doing, it would not be research, would it?’ While keeping an open mind, Venice Takeaway presents a set of clear intentions that we hope will be pursued beyond the life of the exhibition.
Emporium Space
Public Works, Urban Projects Bureau and Owen Pritchard
Elias Redstone
dRMM
Smout Allen and bldgblog
aberrant architecture
Forum for Alternative Belfast
Ross Anderson and Anna Gibb
Darryl Chen
Toh Shimazaki
