THE MANIFESTO
Architecture and buildings make up solid, slow moving urban landscapes. Buildings are designed to last 30 years, 50 years, 200 years. There is solidity, a permanency in the existence of architecture and the built environment. Cities do not change overnight, they evolve over time. Often, this change is in-perceptible to the user or inhabitant of the city. It is a part of the subconscious, the change only recalled through photographs, moving images, stories, and, the mind.
Reflecting upon this, it becomes apparent that cities themselves also become repositories of memory. As the buildings and urban form experience time, they also record it. Paint jobs, renovations, additions, subtractions and demolitions all mark moments of history within our urban environment. In a city such as Perth, shaped over time by a boom and bust cycle, there is often an erased memory – the old buildings are no longer standing. They are remembered as images of the past, stored in libraries and books. Thus, the collective memory of what the city once was fades over time. This temporary exhibition pavilion can be a source of memory, a place where people stop, look inside and see what the city once was.
My interest is to see what happens when the life-cycle of a building or a piece of architecture is shortened. Instead of being built to last 30 years, what happens if a piece of architecture is built to last 30 hours? Instead of being considered “permanent”, what happens when architecture is thought of as “temporary”?
Does a temporary building question the relationship between inhabitant of urban space and their environment? Is the fact that the building exists for a short period of time a catalyst to spark the consciousness towards inhabitation of a built environment?
Can a temporary building actually awaken the city dweller, heightening their sense of awareness of the urban environment in which they live? Can its temporal existence cause the user of the city to step back, look at the city, and, perhaps, consider their relationship to it? The fleeting presence of an architectural object as an urban intervention could spark interest, activity and conscious thought about the urban realm. The temporary building can exist as a moment, a brief performance, a memory of the urban environment that passes us by.
A TEMPORARY EXHIIBITION PAVILION
Capable of exhibiting a small photographic or equivalent display, the exhibition pavilion will be initially designed and developed at UWA in the architecture workshop. Once developed, the pavilion will be installed into the urban environment of Perth, in the public space adjacent to the Perth Town Hall. Whilst in the urban space, the pavilion will display historical architectural images of the city, specific to the site it occupies. There is the potential for the pavilion to also showcase architectural images of proposed developments, ideas and thoughts about the architectural future of the city of Perth. The pavilion will be designed to encourage contributions and interaction by the public regarding the content and development of architecture in the city of Perth.
The exhibition content will be developed concurrently to the development of the pavilion, and may use historical images from collections such as the Battye Library, UWA library, the City of Perth and other databases. There is also the potential for the pavilion to showcase images, sound and video streaming of the development and installation of the object into the city, and user reactions to this.
The pavilion will inhabit the urban environment for a fixed time, up to a week, after which it will be removed from the city. Following the removal of the object from the city, the pavilion will be re-assembled and constructed at the UWA Cullity Gallery or ALVA courtyard, where it will showcase published images, audio and video of the architectural process that created it.
A PHOTOGRAPHIC SURVEY OF THE SITE
Exhibited within the pavilion, a photographic and historical survey of the project site will be developed over 100 days. This survey and exhibition will document and display the ideas and theoretical approaches driving the temporary piece of architecture. The exhibition will be specific to the site, and in a larger context, the city of Perth, with images and text of the city and urban environment that once existed at that place displayed.
The exhibition will be a visual display and documentation of the ideas and theories driving the temporary piece of architecture.
A ‘LIVE’ SITE ANALYSIS
The inhabitation and occupation of the urban environment will be developed and exhibited as a ‘live’ site analysis. Images and analysis of the project site will be carried out prior to the installation of the pavilion object. These images and analysis will then be compared and contrasted with ‘live’ up-to-date images of the occupation of the site and the project throughout the installed timeline. This comparison will provide a real-time display of the impact, interactions and reactions to the temporary piece of architecture.
The site analysis will be recorded and displayed in the pavilion at the conclusion of the project.
MODELS, PROTOTYPES, DRAWINGS, IMAGES, TEXT
The complete design process and development of the object will be documented and available through tools and methods associated with architectural development. These will include models, one-to-one prototypes, drawings, images and text.
These objects of process will be virtually exhibited online during the development of the project. The objects will also be exhibited in the pavilion at the conclusion of the project.
PROCESS
The project will be delivered and published online throughout the process. This documentation will chart the process and development of the project, and will include photographs and text, audio and video of the design, development, construction, installation, and inhabitation, plus the deconstruction process.
These documents will be collected and developed over the course of the project. At the conclusion of the project, the project data will be exhibited in the pavilion itself.
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Hi Kuks,
That’s great!! I look forward to seeing how the architecture develops to convey your ideas!
Kate
Hi Kate,
Far from being negative, I see this project and the intentions of it in an absolutely positive way!
A Recession can be the catalyst for a period of creative, vibrant, and interesting architecture and artistic thinking. I am calling for a creative revolution in architecture in the city of Perth. As architects and pracitioners trained in visual literacy, we have a responsibility to develop, question and enhance the environment, culture and place in which we live. The Recession provides an opportunity to be a part of a dynamic, vibrant, experimental and provocative architectural movement, specific for Perth and Western Australia.
We can follow the spirit of the Russian students in the 1980s, or any avant-garde movement throughout history, and create our own way of creatively dealing with the social, political and economic limiting conditions of our time.
As such, this pavilion will not be ‘doom and gloom’ - it will try and develop and express some ideas that look forward into the future of the city, rather than dwelling negatively on the current and the past.
Hi Kuks,
What is your position on paper architecture?
What is the revolution that Perth is in need of?
How do you want to make people feel when they visit your installation? For me it feels pretty doom-and-gloom ‘pity me, I’m a poor architect’. Is that what’s intended? Considering architects aren’t the only ones out of work at the moment, i’m not sure a lot of people would have much sympathy. Personally, I don’t find negativity helpful unless it comes with something constructive.
Does everything really go underground / upside-down in a recession? Boom times are not always good for city-building - St Georges Tce (and the demolition of nearly all it’s historic buildings) is the product of a boom.
There’s an article by Justine Clark in the latest AA (p14) about graduating into a recession that you might find interesting. Do we really have no work? I wonder how the skills we have as architects can be used creatively when there’s not much conventional architecture work around.
Your project is raising some really interesting questions, kuks. Which is great!! And the stencilling looks fantastic!