Architect 2014-07.pdf

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CENTER
ARCHITECT THE AIA MAGAZINE JULY 2014
CRITIQUE
THE CULT OF KOOLHAAS
REM KOOLHAAS’S OWN EXHIBITIONS AT THE 14TH INTERNATIONAL ARCHITECTURE
EXHIBITION AT THE VENICE BIENNALE MAY HAVE MISSED THE MARK, BUT HIS INFLUENCE
AS CHIEF CURATOR BROUGHT OUT THE BEST IN THE NATIONAL PAVILIONS.
WWW.ARCHITECTMAGAZINE.COM
Visitors arrive at the
Arsenale in Venice for
the 14th International
Architecture Exhibition,
curated by Rem Koolhaas.
Exhibits are housed not
only in the Arsenale,
which is the city’s former
shipyards, but also in the
national pavilions and
Central Pavilion in the
nearby Giardini park.
Text by Ian Volner
“REM IS LIKE a great journalist of architecture,”
said Ricardo Bofill Jr., sitting downstairs in
Venice’s Palazzo Bembo on the third day of the
2014 Architecture Biennale. Two flights up, the
peripheral exhibition “Time Space Existence”
included a sampling of recent work from
Bofill’s (and his famous father’s) eponymous
office in Barcelona, Spain, alongside a
surprisingly vast array of installations from
firms around the world. The Bofills have
seen more than their fair share of Biennales—
including the seminal 1980 “Strada Novissima”
show, in which the elder designer played an
important role—and for Bofill the Younger, the
2014 installment seemed like it could mark
yet another key inflection point for the field,
a credit to curator Rem Koolhaas, Hon. FAIA,
and his ability to weave history and design
into a compelling narrative—ostensibly
unified by his title,“Fundamentals. “For Rem,
it all comes back to telling a story,” Bofill says.
But what exactly Koolhaas thinks the
next chapter in that story is meant to be was
difficult to discern, at least judging from
his particular contributions to the current
Biennale. The Bembo show (organized by the
independent Global Art Affairs Foundation)
was altogether a more comprehensive view of
contemporary practice than either Koolhaas’s
technically minded “Elements of Architecture”
exhibition at the Central Pavilion or his
“Monditalia” show at the Arsenale. In many
ways, the leading man in the Biennale
drama appeared to have departed from his
own script.
The emerging consensus during the
preview (consensuses during the Biennale
having a tendency to fade in and out
somewhat) was that the real action was
taking place in the national pavilions.
Clogging the paths and courtyards of the
Giardini, Prosecco-tippling design fans flocked
to see the opening the Belgian Pavilion (a
spare, cerebral investigation of interior space),
RUY TEIXEIRA