UPCOMING 5
EXPORTING SUPERHEROES SNEAK PREVIEW OF THE IABR BY WING (YINJUN WENG)
FINALLY, IT’S TIME TO UNVEIL THE GRAND SHOW. THE CHAIR OF DESIGN AS POLITICS AT TU DELFT IS GIVING THEIR FINAL TOUCHES ON THE EXHIBITION IN THE 5TH INTERNATIONAL ARCHITECTURE BIENNALE ROTTERDAM (IABR). B NIEUWS TALKS TO PROF. WOUTER VANSTIPHOUT AND BRINGS YOU A SNEAK PREVIEW OF THE EXHIBITION.
The Export Paradox It all started with a puzzling paradox that has long intrigued Wouter Vanstiphout and his fellow researchers. For years, there has been a hype of exporting Dutch expertise in architecture and urban planning across the globe. Such export is no longer limited in the engagement of Dutch practice in foreign countries. It is now also being promoted and outsourced by architecture institutions and organizations such as NAi and IABR. ‘Dutch architects and planners have huge reputations abroad. They are widely welcomed as if they are superheroes coming from outer space to teach lessons’, says Vanstiphout. 'While NAi now acts as an impresario, making deals with Chinese project developers, IABR is doing the same by brokering deals on high political level in São Paulo and Istanbul.’ However, despite the exciting image of Holland as a super planning country, the architectural infrastructure and practice within the country is in fact shrinking under the influence of enormous budget cuts. ‘The paradox lies between the expanding reputation and engagement abroad and a shrinking industry within the country’, says Vanstiphout. ‘Quite often the Dutch are exporting yesterday’s models to other countries. The Dutch need to redefine themselves and regain the ability to innovate, in order to sustain its charisma as a super planning laboratory country. Just exporting the planning charisma as a marketing strategy is simply not enough’. Moreover, the increasing Dutch practice abroad is also resulting in a strange trade. While countries in Asia and South America begin to embrace modernity brought by the Dutch architects and planners, the Dutch tend to bring back a nostalgic image of the world outside filled with orientalism and exoticism. Vanstiphout concludes: ‘It seems as if we are trading our modernity for their wild unfettered urbanization.’ Are We The World? Echoing the theme ‘making city’, the chair of Design as Politics aims to raise the question on the paradoxical situation of Dutch planning in the 5th IABR. The chair will publish a collection of research conducted both inside the chair and through collaboration with other researchers at TU Delft. Titled ‘Are we the world?’, the research publication will be the 6th issue of the Design and Politics series. It offers a historical narrative of the Dutch planning export paradox, compares the Randstad with São Paulo, Istanbul and Detroit, and speculates about alternative visions for city planning and idealistic architectural intervention for the cities involved. To further examine the ongoing injection of Dutch models in other countries, the chair brings together intellectuals from different backgrounds who are able to reflect the Dutch practice in their own cities. Ekim Tan, for instance, contributes her research on Istanbul to the book, which tries to translate the Dutch development showcased in Almere into a new kind of planning system for Istanbul. Roberto Rocco also
joins the discussion and states in his manifesto that the crucial issue in São Paulo is a lack of democracy instead of a technical or spatial problem in planning. According to Prof. Vanstiphout, their studies have become valuable assets for the research. Their background, together with their practice in the Netherlands, has led to a much more inspiring exchange of ideas. In the end, the book is calling for more political engagement of architecture and urbanism, which echoes the spirit of the chair of Design as Politics. ‘Design should become a political tool in a positive way. The book is a plea for more democracy, emancipation and selfdetermination, in which planning should and can play a role’, says Vanstiphout.
The Biennale Show The Design as Politics chair will present their research in different forms at the Rotterdam Biennale. There will be firstly a narrative of historical events where urban unrest and planning intersect, in order to reveal the ties between design and politics. These will be represented in eight three dimensional tableaux that look like hybrids of altarpieces and movie posters. The ‘ghost of the lafayette park’ for example, will tell a dark story of how Mies van de Rohe’s planning in Detroit triggered devastating riots in the 60s. The five cities - Istanbul, Detroit, São Paulo, Rotterdam and Amsterdam - will be presented in five huge panoramas of allegorical paintings, which illustrate not only the physical city spaces, but also their political landscape behind it. A selection of student projects will be included in the exhibition as well. They are the graduation and PhD projects conducted in the chair in the past two years, from reuse of a Panoptical Prison in Rotterdam to a housing project on the roofs of the office buildings in the City of London. Lastly, the chair is trying to set up a temporary design studio at the Biennale. Prof. Vanstiphout explains: ‘We would like to move our studio there. For two months, the students can work in Rotterdam, practically in the scene of the Biennale, and the visitors can see how the projects and research are done in real life.’ For more info: iabr.nl designaspolitics.wordpress.com
IABR Exhibition - Design as Politics Exhibition: 20th April - 7th July | Hofbogen, Rotterdam Book Release: 24th April | NAi, Rotterdam