OFFICEUS: BULLETS WITH-OUT IDEOLOGY
Saturday November 15, 2014 – Sunday November 23, 2014
BULLETS WITH-OUT IDEOLOGY
With the participation of Gene Kohn (KPF), Shawn McLearen, Antoni Muntadas, Ippolito Pestellini, Amie Siegel, OfficeUS Partners and Founders among others.
November 17-23, 2014
US Pavilion, Giardini (Venice, Italy)
Monditalia, Arsenale (Venice, Italy)
OfficeUS, with its first headquarters at the Venice Architecture Biennale, was founded in 2014 with the mission to critically reflect on the production of architecture globally today. Taking as transversal lens of inquiry an archive that contains the production of US firms in a global context over the last hundred years and the architecture offices themselves, OfficeUS has been simultaneously looking backwards and forward while projecting a new model for global architectural practice open to all of us.
Over the last twenty-five weeks of the Biennale, the OfficeUS Partners, Arielle Assouline-Lichten, Cooking Sections: Daniel Fernández Pascual & Alon Schwabe, Curtis Roth, Manuel Shvartzberg Carrió, Matteo Ghidoni, and M-A-U-S-E-R: Mona Mahall & Asli Serbest have been addressing the 25 OfficeUS Issues, working in collaboration with global outpost offices and a diverse cast of visiting experts, from high rise engineers to students, submitting historical material to contemporary critique while projecting an alternative future where issues become assets.
The closing Issue of OfficeUS, Bullets With-Out Ideology, aims to address the role of architects in the perpetuation or redefinition of current economic, social and political forms of action.
For the last week of OfficeUS in Venice, OfficeUS Partners will target some of the projects to be developed in the future present, including PARK, an investigation on corporate social responsibility, and the way the project’s structures and forms shape the future of our cities.
Below is a series of events, screenings and lectures that will take place throughout the week:
Friday, November 16, 1pm
US Pavilion in the Giardini
Shawn McLearen lecures on American Capital & Local Cultural Ecosystems – Towards a Cultural Development Corporation
Tuesday November 18 to Sunday, November 23, 11am-6pm
Stage D, Arsenale
The Architects a film by Amie Siegel commissioned for the closing of OfficeUS screens at the Arsenale, at stage D of Monditalia.
Wednesday, November 19, 11am-6pm
US Pavilion in the Giardini
A photographic essay by Brett Beyer “Seven fundamental views of the Architectural Office” is presented throughout the day.
Thursday, November 20, 11am-6pm
US Pavilion in the Giardini
A digital essay by Studio Indefinit of aerial images of the almost thousand projects contained in the Repository is on display throughout the day.
Friday November 21, 11am
US Pavilion in the Giardini
A. Eugene Kohn, the Chairman of Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates, who founded KPF on July 4, 1976 along William Pedersen and Sheldon Fox, will lecture on the development of KPF global strategy and some of the major international projects the firm has constructed over the years.
As part of the ongoing research of OfficeUS, Studio Indefinit has extracted as a composite global map the satellite site images of the projects contained in the OfficeUS Repository exhibition at OfficeUS. The full project, World Sites, is on display at the OfficeUS, the US Pavilion in Venice on November 21st and on November 23rd.
Saturday, November 22, 12pm
US Pavilion in the Giardini
Amie Siegel, along with invited curators, media theorists and filmmakers discuss The Architects a film by Amie Siegel and commissioned for the closing of OfficeUS.
Saturday November 22, 10pm – late
Venue TBA
An event curated by OfficeUS Partners marks the closing of OfficeUS in Venice.
Sunday November 23, 11am-6pm
US Pavilion in the Giardini
OfficeUS Partners, Founders and a cast of guests and curators close the United States of America Pavilion at the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale with a working session, and a series of conversation with invited guests, including the presentation of the second publication of OfficeUS, OfficeUS Atlas, and the upcoming exhibition in Spring 2015 at Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York, as well as the future paths of OfficeUS. Studio Indefinit’s project, World Sites will be on display.
Participant Bios
Studio Indefinit focuses on the interplay between human activity and sensory perception to create immersive, interactive environments. Its members combine their unique backgrounds in acoustics, architecture, sound design, music, user experience, and software development, relying on a common language of sound and space to convert original concepts into tangible experiences.
Shawn McLearen is a real estate developer and Member of Storefront for Art for Architecture. Until recently he served as Vice President of Property Development for Artspace Projects – America’s largest non-profit real estate developer for the arts – where he helped raise over $100M toward the completion of projects in New York. He lives in Manhattan with his wife Ming.
Brett Beyer is an architectural and fine art photographer based in Brooklyn, New York. He received his degree in studio art from Bard College. His work has appeared in publications such as The New York Times Magazine, American Photography, Rolling Stone, Dwell, Fast Company, and The Cornell Journal of Architecture. Some of his architectural clients include Cornell Architecture Art & Planning, OMA, and SOM. His recent group exhibitions include “5 Beekman” as part of Visions at Temple Court in New York City, and “OMA: Aerial/Interior” as part of the International Photography Awards Best of Show in Los Angeles. In 2013 he took part in a week-long residency as part of the 30th anniversary show “Being” at Storefront for Art and Architecture. He is currently photographing architectural offices in New York City to be shown at the OfficeUS Pavilion for the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale.
Amie Siegel. Ranging from photographs, video, film installations, and feature films for the cinema, American artist Amie Siegel’s work has been exhibited in solo exhibitions including Amie Siegel: Provenance, currently on view at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, as well as solo and group exhibitions at MoMA/PS1, MAXXI Rome, Hayward Gallery, London, Whitney Museum of American Art, Walker Art Center, Kunstmuseum Stuttgart and KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin. Her films have screened at Cannes, Berlin, New York and Toronto Film Festivals, The Museum of Modern Art, New York and The National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. She has been a fellow of the DAAD Berliner-Künstlerprogramm, Guggenheim Foundation, and is the recipient of a Sundance Institute Film Fund award.
A. Eugene Kohn, Chairman of Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates, founded KPF along with William Pedersen and Sheldon Fox, based on a commitment to design service and excellence. Gene has served as Partner-in-Charge of many of KPF’s major domestic and international projects and is responsible for many of the firm’s new commissions. He has developed a global strategy and has shaped the firm into one of the world’s leaders in all aspects of architectural practice.
Alberto Momo (1972). Film lover, critic and independent film-maker, he lives and works in Torino. After his architecture studies, he makes videos and documentaries, screened in festivals such as Venezia, Locarno, Rotterdam, Montréal. His special interest is in spatial character of cinema. He made architecture movies for the Accademia di San Luca in Roma and La Biennale di Venezia (2012). He won best Italian documentary in Torino 2006 with a portrait of the Italian architect Elio Luzi. He worked also for TV programs on Italian broadcasts Rai3 and Rai4. PhD in Architecture with a work on Italian television landscape, lecturer in cinema, architecture, city and territory at the Politecnico of Torino. He writes for several revues and publications (Blow Up, Il Manifesto, Il giornale dell’architettura, l’Enciclopedia Treccani). In 2013, he published with Donatello Fumarola the book Atlante sentimentale del cinema per il XXI secolo, 50 conversations with most important contemporary filmmakers. As a curator, he realized an installation about Torino in television history within the exibition 011 Torino (with Filippo De Pieri, 2008) and the movie-map of Italy in the exibition Monditalia at La Biennale di Architettura of Venezia 2014, with 80 sequences from italian movies in 60 screens.
Born in 1942 in Barcelona, Antoni Muntadas has lived and worked in New York since 1971. His work has been exhibited internationally, including the 51st Venice Biennale (Spanish Pavilion), Documenta VI and X, and the Sao Paulo, Whitney, Lyon, Gwangju and Istanbul Biennales. Solo exhibitions include The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Berkeley Art Museum in California, the Musee d’Art Contemporain de Montreal, the Capc de Bordeaux, France, the Museo de Arte Moderna de Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, and the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia in Madrid, among other institutions. Muntadas has a long-standing academic career, teaching in universities worldwide.
Ippolito Pestellini Laparelli joined OMA in 2007 and is based in Rotterdam. Pestellini’s work and research at OMA/AMO has a focus on design, preservation, scenography, and curation. He currently leads the transformation design of the 16th century Fondaco dei Tedeschi in Venice, and developed Monditalia, a multi-disciplinary exhibition focused on Italy, at the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale. Recently, Pestellini has directed the design of OMA’s Tools for Life furniture collection for Knoll, led architectural competitions including the expansion of Bocconi University in Milan and the Tecnopole of Bologna, designed scenography for the Greek theater of Siracusa in Sicily, and co-curated Cronocaos, OMA’s exhibition on preservation at the 2010 Venice Architectural Biennale. Since 2010, Pestellini has overseen a range of AMO projects with Prada, including stage design for fashion shows and directing special events and publications. He contributes to the curatorial development and exhibition design for Fondazione Prada, with projects such When Attitudes Become Form: 1969/2013 in Venice. He holds a Master of Architecture from the Politecnico di Milano.
Davide Rapp. 1980, architect and videomaker, graduated at Politecnico di Milano. Since 2005 he has been collaborating with several architectural offices in Milano (mutti&architetti, Stefano Boeri Architetti). He is a PH.d candidate in Interior Design at Politecnico di Milano. He presented his work and research at different international schools of design and architecture, delivering lectures at Domus Academy , Milano – NABA , Milano – Politecnico di Milano – Burg Giebichenstein Kunsthochschule , Halle. He is co-author (with Alberto Iacovoni, Rome) of the graphic-essay Playscape (Edizioni Libria, 2009) looking at the public space as a promising field of experimental architectures. He is co-author (with Federico Bernocchi and Francesca Benedetto, Milano) of The Dog From The City (Milano, 2013), a short movie describing the relationship between Nature and the City through the eyes of a dog walking in parks and public spaces. He participated in the 14th International Architecture Exhibition – Fundamentals (Biennale Venezia, 2014) with the project ‘Elements’, a movie montage of short architecture-related clips conceived specifically for the intro room of the exhibition Elements of Architecture.