NESS.docs #1 Hashim Sarkis Studios 1998 – 2017

Florencia Rodriguez flor@lotsofarchitecture.com

Published in 2017 by Lots of Architecture Publishers

EDITORS AT LARGE FOR NESS.DOCS 1

José Mayoral Felipe Vera

CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER

Pablo Gerson pablo@lotsofarchitecture.com

EDITORS FOR NESS.DOCS 1

Daniela Freiberg Federico Liberati Florencia Medina

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, distributed or transmitted in any form or any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publishers.

PHOTO EDITOR

Mariam Samur

CONTRIBUTING EDITOR FROM HSS

Andre Malan

DESIGN DIRECTOR

Diego Valiña teoriaypractica.com

All project credits provided by Hashim Sarkis Studios.

PROOFREADER

Lisa Ubelaker Andrade

© 2017 Lots of Architecture, LLC

TEXTS BY

Stan Allen Angelo Bucci Kenneth Frampton Fabrizio Gallanti Pablo Gerson Gabriel Kozlowski José Mayoral Luca Molinari Florencia Rodriguez Hashim Sarkis Nader Tehrani Felipe Vera

1680 Michigan Ave. Floor 10 / Suite 1000 Miami Beach, FL 33139 Tel: +1 (617) 674-2656 hello@lotsofarchitecture.com www.lotsofarchitecture.com

PHOTOGRAPHERS

Joumana Arab Wissam Chaaya Pablo Gerson Roland Halbe Florencia Rodriguez Javier Agustín Rojas Jonathan Scelsa Jean Yasmine

COVER PHOTOGRAPH

Pablo Gerson

We care about cultural producers and the acknowledgement of the works and images here presented. We apologize for any errors or omissions.

ISSN 2574-8343 Printed in the U.S.

We are very proud to introduce Lots of Architecture with the first issue of our monographic series, dedicated to the work and thoughts of Hashim Sarkis Studios. One of our aims as a publisher is to serve as a magnifying glass, amplifying valuable practices and modes of thought that contribute positively to the disciplinary state of the arts, advocating for the transforming capabilities of design and architecture.

We believe this editorial piece is a perfect opportunity to reflect upon the fact that, beyond Sarkis’s brilliant and renowned academic career, his body of work in architecture constitutes a committed—and singularly brave—project.

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Foreword.

Pablo Gerson & Florencia Rodriguez.

6

Understanding a Reflective Practice: Drawing the Third Line.

José Mayoral & Felipe Vera.

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CYANOMETRICS Text – Hashim Sarkis.

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PROJECTS 29 42 47 63 69 81 101 105 113 125

-NESS.docs is a product of Lots of Architecture: an editorial platform dedicated to Architecture, Life and Urban Culture founded by Pablo Gerson and Florencia Rodriguez in 2017.

147

Co-edited by Lots of Architecture with José Mayoral and Felipe Vera

www.nessmagazine.com

On architecture, life and urban culture

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Balloon Landing Park.

— The Politics of Play. Nader Tehrani.

Housing for the Fishermen.

— Autonomy as Engagement. Hashim Sarkis.

Daily Mosque.

Town Hall & Park.

— For a Tectonic of Megaliths. Hashim Sarkis.

Float Pavilion.

Watermelon Landscape.

Courtowers.

DIALOGUES 148 The NESS.docs Interview: Hashim Sarkis Studios.

Where the contingent meets the transcendent.

José Mayoral & Florencia Rodriguez.

160

A Conversation between Angelo Bucci & Hashim Sarkis.

Hashim Sarkis, meanings and unfoldings of a visit to São Paulo.

Angelo Bucci.

174

Scale Discussion.

Stan Allen, Kenneth Frampton & Hashim Sarkis.

PORTFOLIO FINAL SEQUENCE

Hashim Sarkis Studios 1998—2017

Coedited by: Lots of Architecture publishers, José Mayoral & Felipe Vera.

Texts by: Stan Allen, Angelo Bucci, Kenneth Frampton, Fabrizio Gallanti, Pablo Gerson, Gabriel Kozlowski, José Mayoral, Luca Molinari, Florencia Rodriguez, Hashim Sarkis, Nader Tehrani & Felipe Vera.

US$ 20.00

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183 188

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Hashim Sarkis Studios

EDITOR IN CHIEF

Hashim Sarkis Studios has worked in rural and urban locations ranging from the United States to the Middle East in the fields of landscape, urban design and mixed-use, institutional and residential architecture.

In their nearly 20 years of practice, Hashim Sarkis Studios’ work has received numerous awards, has been extensively published, and has exhibited widely.

Sarkis is also the Dean of the School of Architecture + Planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a position he has held since 2014. From 1995 to 2014 he was on the faculty of the Harvard University Graduate School of Design.

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Cyanometrics

CYANOMETER / PH – BIBLIOTÈQUE DE GENÈVE, SWITZERLAND

During his expeditions to South America, Alexander von Humboldt would carry a cyanometer, a device to measure the blue of the sky. Like other scientists before him, he noticed that the intensity of sky’s color changed with humidity.

The cyanometer consisted of a ring of blue swatches, each with a shade and number. Each time he visited a location, he would describe in detail its geography and landscape.

He would then rotate the ring of blues until he identified the swatch that matched the color of the sky, at that moment, in that place.

For each location, there was a measurable sky blue.

Humboldt would soon realize that there were factors other than humidity that determined the sky’s shade of blue, and that particles in the air contaminated the direct connection between blue and locality. Although Humboldt would eventually give up the cyanometer, this gesture, of turning to the sky in order to identify and measure the discerning attributes of a location, can provide much needed insight about how to think of identity in a globalizing world. Every building could aspire to inject a specific blueness into the world.

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11

Cyanometrics

CYANOMETER / PH – BIBLIOTÈQUE DE GENÈVE, SWITZERLAND

During his expeditions to South America, Alexander von Humboldt would carry a cyanometer, a device to measure the blue of the sky. Like other scientists before him, he noticed that the intensity of sky’s color changed with humidity.

The cyanometer consisted of a ring of blue swatches, each with a shade and number. Each time he visited a location, he would describe in detail its geography and landscape.

He would then rotate the ring of blues until he identified the swatch that matched the color of the sky, at that moment, in that place.

For each location, there was a measurable sky blue.

Humboldt would soon realize that there were factors other than humidity that determined the sky’s shade of blue, and that particles in the air contaminated the direct connection between blue and locality. Although Humboldt would eventually give up the cyanometer, this gesture, of turning to the sky in order to identify and measure the discerning attributes of a location, can provide much needed insight about how to think of identity in a globalizing world. Every building could aspire to inject a specific blueness into the world.

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15

Encrusting

COURTOWERS / PH – WISSAM CHAAYA

How, then, to place a building between the ground and the sky?

Architecture exists between those two domains, sitting on or carving into one, rising against the other, and creating intermediary worlds between the two. It does make a difference if the mass of the building is treated as an added thickness to the surface of the earth or as an object that sits on the ground and against the sky. An immeasurable spectrum of possibilities can be explored between two lines, the ground line and the skyline. Is the inhabited world merely the line between earth and sky, or is it a whole space between the two realms?

What happens when the building consists of both a plinth and an object on top? Is this a state of indecision or a third alternative?

Each possibility shapes our understanding of the world.

In geological time, these decisions may not be significant.

Geologists today argue that technological debris is creating a new surface layer for the earth. In other words, all buildings will ultimately fold into this new geological crust.

Geographically, however, these decisions matter a great deal.

They help determine if architecture exists in a state of mediation with the earth and the sky or if it is immediate.

They also determine the extent to which architecture is embracing its ecumenal role, its role in making us aware of the connectedness and continuity of the inhabited world.

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15

Encrusting

COURTOWERS / PH – WISSAM CHAAYA

How, then, to place a building between the ground and the sky?

Architecture exists between those two domains, sitting on or carving into one, rising against the other, and creating intermediary worlds between the two. It does make a difference if the mass of the building is treated as an added thickness to the surface of the earth or as an object that sits on the ground and against the sky. An immeasurable spectrum of possibilities can be explored between two lines, the ground line and the skyline. Is the inhabited world merely the line between earth and sky, or is it a whole space between the two realms?

What happens when the building consists of both a plinth and an object on top? Is this a state of indecision or a third alternative?

Each possibility shapes our understanding of the world.

In geological time, these decisions may not be significant.

Geologists today argue that technological debris is creating a new surface layer for the earth. In other words, all buildings will ultimately fold into this new geological crust.

Geographically, however, these decisions matter a great deal.

They help determine if architecture exists in a state of mediation with the earth and the sky or if it is immediate.

They also determine the extent to which architecture is embracing its ecumenal role, its role in making us aware of the connectedness and continuity of the inhabited world.

Balloon Landing Park

30 DATES

2004-2005 (built)

DESIGN TEAM

LOCATION

Beirut, Lebanon

Hashim Sarkis, Pars Kibarer, Brian Mulder, Joaquin Perez-Goicochea,

SITE AREA

3500 m2 / 37,675 sf

Jonathan Cicconi, Tarek Sallowman

BUILDING AREA

1500 m2 / 16,000 sf

CLIENT

Round Concepts, Etc

STRUCTURAL ENGINEER

Mohamed Chahine

ELECTRO–MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Aurora

PROJECT MANAGER

Mohamed Chahine

PHOTOGRAPHER

Joumana Arab

MODEL PHOTOGRAPHER

Pablo Gerson

A square reverberates in plan and in section to generate a park of multiple layers that affords open access and a multiplicity of functions.

Based on the new plan for downtown Beirut, a large area along the waterfront was cleared and re-planned to become an extension of the abutting hotel district. In the planning phase, many of the parcels were rented out for temporary use. Most of these spaces were entertainment related (basketball courts, children’s museums and playgrounds, etc.).

The client requested several kiosks and a platform for an Aerophile 30, a tethered helium balloon that takes up to fifteen passengers to see the view from nearly 300 meters above the city, and then descends in less than fifteen minutes.

Instead of encumbering the ground with kiosks and disturbing the visual presence of the balloon, the project uses the natural slope of the site to tuck the kiosks under the landing platform while keeping it accessible from the lower end of the site.

Rather than flattening the diagonally skewed ground and encumbering it with kiosks, the design maintains the site’s slope, lifts the ground in the form of a green slab from its lowest corner to a point as high as the uppermost corner, and tucks the waiting and entertainment areas under it at street level. Other planes are introduced. The balloon sits on the flat level of the opposite diagonal of the site that is extended into a mezzanine plane and the sloping ground is carried into the waiting area. The different planes of the project interpenetrate both sectionally and planimetrically.

The retaining walls are made of chevron patterned concrete that resemble the graphics of a hatched section of the earth. The pattern provides the geometric basis for a signage system similar to that of airports.

From both the ground and the sky, the reverberations of the square figure created by the platform intensify the impression of multiple layers.

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Balloon Landing Park

30 DATES

2004-2005 (built)

DESIGN TEAM

LOCATION

Beirut, Lebanon

Hashim Sarkis, Pars Kibarer, Brian Mulder, Joaquin Perez-Goicochea,

SITE AREA

3500 m2 / 37,675 sf

Jonathan Cicconi, Tarek Sallowman

BUILDING AREA

1500 m2 / 16,000 sf

CLIENT

Round Concepts, Etc

STRUCTURAL ENGINEER

Mohamed Chahine

ELECTRO–MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Aurora

PROJECT MANAGER

Mohamed Chahine

PHOTOGRAPHER

Joumana Arab

MODEL PHOTOGRAPHER

Pablo Gerson

A square reverberates in plan and in section to generate a park of multiple layers that affords open access and a multiplicity of functions.

Based on the new plan for downtown Beirut, a large area along the waterfront was cleared and re-planned to become an extension of the abutting hotel district. In the planning phase, many of the parcels were rented out for temporary use. Most of these spaces were entertainment related (basketball courts, children’s museums and playgrounds, etc.).

The client requested several kiosks and a platform for an Aerophile 30, a tethered helium balloon that takes up to fifteen passengers to see the view from nearly 300 meters above the city, and then descends in less than fifteen minutes.

Instead of encumbering the ground with kiosks and disturbing the visual presence of the balloon, the project uses the natural slope of the site to tuck the kiosks under the landing platform while keeping it accessible from the lower end of the site.

Rather than flattening the diagonally skewed ground and encumbering it with kiosks, the design maintains the site’s slope, lifts the ground in the form of a green slab from its lowest corner to a point as high as the uppermost corner, and tucks the waiting and entertainment areas under it at street level. Other planes are introduced. The balloon sits on the flat level of the opposite diagonal of the site that is extended into a mezzanine plane and the sloping ground is carried into the waiting area. The different planes of the project interpenetrate both sectionally and planimetrically.

The retaining walls are made of chevron patterned concrete that resemble the graphics of a hatched section of the earth. The pattern provides the geometric basis for a signage system similar to that of airports.

From both the ground and the sky, the reverberations of the square figure created by the platform intensify the impression of multiple layers.

31

Housing for the Fishermen

48 DATES

1998-2008 (built)

DESIGN TEAM

LOCATION

Abbasiyeh, Tyre, Lebanon

Hashim Sarkis, Anuraj Shah And Erkin Ozay (Project Coordinators),

SITE AREA

6500 m2 / 70,000 sf

Ziad Jamaleddine, Paul Kaloustian, Brian Mulder, David Hill, Mete

BUILT AREA

8400 m2 / 90,400 sf

Sonmez, Ryan Bollom, Ezra Block, Cynthia Gunadi, Scott Hagen,

STRUCTURAL ENGINEERS

Mohamed Chahine And

Cheyne Owens

Mounir Mabsout PROJECT MANAGER

Mohamed Chahine

CLIENT

ELECTRO–MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Aurora

Al Baqaa Housing Cooperative and The Association for the Develop-

CONTRACTOR

Ebco-Bitar

ment of Rural Areas in Southern Lebanon, Yousif Khalil, Director

MODEL PHOTOGRAPHER

Pablo Gerson

PHOTOGRAPHERS

Joumana Arab

DONORS

(pp. 61, 64, 66 & 67)

Greek Catholic Church of Tyre, Spanish Agency for International

Jean Yasmine (p.51)

Cooperation, and several private donors

This new typology of collective housing is generated by wrapping a thin band of interlocking simplexes and duplexes around a common courtyard and by diversifying the unit types even further with private open spaces.

to view, the units had to be different depending on their location in plan. The project consists of 80 two-bedroom units each about 86 square meters of interior space and about half the area in private outdoor open space.

Given the chaotic and unpredictable conditions of the new context and its isolation from the residential quarters of Tyre, the design defines a strong edge to the outside along the site perimeter. This edge is made of an extenuated building (seven meters thick) that wraps in on itself to create an internal road and an open space. The internal road continues the side street, provides access to the units, and connects the two main access points. The open space provides a common public garden and a playground. In order to avoid a closed, urban-block effect, the linear mass is broken down into a series of buildings separated by gaps that are used for public circulation.

These spaces provide variety within the building volume.

The building mass provides for an increasing enclosure and then releases into the large communal open space. The open space is made of two parts, a paved area with a collective water tank underneath and a planted area.

Instead of framing the parts with trees, trees are used to mark entrances to paths between buildings. The landscape spills through these gaps between the buildings to the exterior to emphasize the connection between the interior open space and the street.

One of the fishermen’s main concerns was maintaining equality among the units. In order to provide for equality, particularly in terms of access to private outdoor space and access

The buildings are colored with shades of blue on the outside and yellows and reds on the inside in a manner that emphasizes the formal wrapping and that accentuates an intermediary scale between the unit and the block. The overlap of the colors with the protruding stairs and balconies gives way to hieroglyphics that overlap with Arabic letters on the screens and entrances.

49

Housing for the Fishermen

48 DATES

1998-2008 (built)

DESIGN TEAM

LOCATION

Abbasiyeh, Tyre, Lebanon

Hashim Sarkis, Anuraj Shah And Erkin Ozay (Project Coordinators),

SITE AREA

6500 m2 / 70,000 sf

Ziad Jamaleddine, Paul Kaloustian, Brian Mulder, David Hill, Mete

BUILT AREA

8400 m2 / 90,400 sf

Sonmez, Ryan Bollom, Ezra Block, Cynthia Gunadi, Scott Hagen,

STRUCTURAL ENGINEERS

Mohamed Chahine And

Cheyne Owens

Mounir Mabsout PROJECT MANAGER

Mohamed Chahine

CLIENT

ELECTRO–MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Aurora

Al Baqaa Housing Cooperative and The Association for the Develop-

CONTRACTOR

Ebco-Bitar

ment of Rural Areas in Southern Lebanon, Yousif Khalil, Director

MODEL PHOTOGRAPHER

Pablo Gerson

PHOTOGRAPHERS

Joumana Arab

DONORS

(pp. 61, 64, 66 & 67)

Greek Catholic Church of Tyre, Spanish Agency for International

Jean Yasmine (p.51)

Cooperation, and several private donors

This new typology of collective housing is generated by wrapping a thin band of interlocking simplexes and duplexes around a common courtyard and by diversifying the unit types even further with private open spaces.

to view, the units had to be different depending on their location in plan. The project consists of 80 two-bedroom units each about 86 square meters of interior space and about half the area in private outdoor open space.

Given the chaotic and unpredictable conditions of the new context and its isolation from the residential quarters of Tyre, the design defines a strong edge to the outside along the site perimeter. This edge is made of an extenuated building (seven meters thick) that wraps in on itself to create an internal road and an open space. The internal road continues the side street, provides access to the units, and connects the two main access points. The open space provides a common public garden and a playground. In order to avoid a closed, urban-block effect, the linear mass is broken down into a series of buildings separated by gaps that are used for public circulation.

These spaces provide variety within the building volume.

The building mass provides for an increasing enclosure and then releases into the large communal open space. The open space is made of two parts, a paved area with a collective water tank underneath and a planted area.

Instead of framing the parts with trees, trees are used to mark entrances to paths between buildings. The landscape spills through these gaps between the buildings to the exterior to emphasize the connection between the interior open space and the street.

One of the fishermen’s main concerns was maintaining equality among the units. In order to provide for equality, particularly in terms of access to private outdoor space and access

The buildings are colored with shades of blue on the outside and yellows and reds on the inside in a manner that emphasizes the formal wrapping and that accentuates an intermediary scale between the unit and the block. The overlap of the colors with the protruding stairs and balconies gives way to hieroglyphics that overlap with Arabic letters on the screens and entrances.

49

Watermelon Landscape

114 DATES

2015 - 2016 (built)

ARCHITECTS

LOCATION

Amman, Jordan / Amman Design Week

Hashim Sarkis & Gabriel Kozlowski

SITE AREA

600 m2 / 6450 sf

WATERMELON VENDORS /

Fayez Abu Awwad + Khdeir Abu Huwash

115

BUILDERS John Ochsendorf + Ali Irani

PHOTOGRAPHER

Roland Halbe

Through collaboration with watermelon vendors, the common practice of stacking watermelons is turned into a landscape that elevates the everyday into an aesthetic experience.

Every summer, Amman is filled with pyramids of watermelons (batteekh in Arabic). Every grocer becomes a pharaoh, and every grocery store becomes a Giza. No fruit lends itself to such architectural use as the watermelon.

The pyramids have become so common in our everyday landscape that we forget how ingeniously they store and display melons. Much of the practice of cultivating watermelons today is focused on improving their structural qualities, their ability to stack and to withhold pressure, but the structural solution for their display was long ago settled on the pyramid and it has not changed much over time.

This landscape installation called Rujm al Batteekh (The Seven Hills of Batteekh) and conceived for the Amman Design Week, celebrated the nutritional, engineering, and aesthetic attributes of watermelons by expanding on possible forms of stacking. Composed of seven rujm-like hills, the project brings the watermelons home, closer to the landscape and history of Amman. It refers to what designers really do: take already developed solutions, improve on them, and elevate them into an aesthetic expression of their function.

Working with local watermelon suppliers the forms were determined in such a way that they would be able to be reorganized everyday without having to undo and redo the whole pyramid.

WATERCOLOR - HSS

STRUCTURAL ADVISORS

Watermelon Landscape

114 DATES

2015 - 2016 (built)

ARCHITECTS

LOCATION

Amman, Jordan / Amman Design Week

Hashim Sarkis & Gabriel Kozlowski

SITE AREA

600 m2 / 6450 sf

WATERMELON VENDORS /

Fayez Abu Awwad + Khdeir Abu Huwash

115

BUILDERS John Ochsendorf + Ali Irani

PHOTOGRAPHER

Roland Halbe

Through collaboration with watermelon vendors, the common practice of stacking watermelons is turned into a landscape that elevates the everyday into an aesthetic experience.

Every summer, Amman is filled with pyramids of watermelons (batteekh in Arabic). Every grocer becomes a pharaoh, and every grocery store becomes a Giza. No fruit lends itself to such architectural use as the watermelon.

The pyramids have become so common in our everyday landscape that we forget how ingeniously they store and display melons. Much of the practice of cultivating watermelons today is focused on improving their structural qualities, their ability to stack and to withhold pressure, but the structural solution for their display was long ago settled on the pyramid and it has not changed much over time.

This landscape installation called Rujm al Batteekh (The Seven Hills of Batteekh) and conceived for the Amman Design Week, celebrated the nutritional, engineering, and aesthetic attributes of watermelons by expanding on possible forms of stacking. Composed of seven rujm-like hills, the project brings the watermelons home, closer to the landscape and history of Amman. It refers to what designers really do: take already developed solutions, improve on them, and elevate them into an aesthetic expression of their function.

Working with local watermelon suppliers the forms were determined in such a way that they would be able to be reorganized everyday without having to undo and redo the whole pyramid.

WATERCOLOR - HSS

STRUCTURAL ADVISORS

63

Autonomy as Engagement Hashim Sarkis

SIDE A1

SIDE A2

SIDE B1

MoMA’s exhibition Small Scale, Big Change exposes the fallacy of opposing architecture’s autonomy to its social engagement.

SIDE B2

SIDE E1

SIDE C1

SIDE E2

SIDE D1

SIDE F1

Over the past twelve years, our office has been working with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in rural Lebanon, designing projects related to social and economic development. After the 1975-1990 wars, many relief-based NGOs have shifted their attention to development. Their numbers, areas of activity, budgets, and impact have increased exponentially as they have moved to partner with international NGOs, the private sector, government agencies, and one another. The growing power of NGOs relative to the state and civil society has been a source of heated debate around the world. They have also become significant clients for architects.

While difficult to generalize, NGO-commissioned projects differ from those of conventional clients in that: – We, as architects, are brought into the project ahead of final decisions about site, program, and budget. As such, we help in determining these factors and in removing significant constraints ahead of design.

– Design becomes an instrument of fund-raising.

SIDE G1

SIDE G2

SIDE H1

– Design and construction schedules are negatively affected by fundraising and donation schedules.

– When communities are involved (and it is not always the case that they are), their members tend to defer to us as ‘experts’ more than regular clients do.

– It is generally accepted that the uniqueness of the social situations addressed by NGOs warrants unique social solutions and therefore unique design solutions.

However, international partners tend to be more comfortable with replicated solutions and with stereotypes of ‘local architecture.’

– In general, however, NGOs want their projects to transcend immediate context. They want to stand out and to strategically displace accepted social and architectural norms.

– The degree to which architects can play a role in this effort depends on the degree of their ‘aesthetic autonomy’—their ability to operate outside of the constraints of context and inherited forms and to provide original expression to emerging audiences.

In this strategic autonomy lies the key to effective social engagement.

– Program, budget, and design tend to constantly change based primarily on targeted donors.

SIDE H2

SIDE I1

SIDE I2

ELEVATIONS

Text originally posted by Hashim Sarkis on October 26th, 2010, regarding MoMA’s exhibition, Small Scale, Big Change. http://www.moma.org/explore/inside_out/2010/10/26/autonomy-as-engagement

63

Autonomy as Engagement Hashim Sarkis

SIDE A1

SIDE A2

SIDE B1

MoMA’s exhibition Small Scale, Big Change exposes the fallacy of opposing architecture’s autonomy to its social engagement.

SIDE B2

SIDE E1

SIDE C1

SIDE E2

SIDE D1

SIDE F1

Over the past twelve years, our office has been working with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in rural Lebanon, designing projects related to social and economic development. After the 1975-1990 wars, many relief-based NGOs have shifted their attention to development. Their numbers, areas of activity, budgets, and impact have increased exponentially as they have moved to partner with international NGOs, the private sector, government agencies, and one another. The growing power of NGOs relative to the state and civil society has been a source of heated debate around the world. They have also become significant clients for architects.

While difficult to generalize, NGO-commissioned projects differ from those of conventional clients in that: – We, as architects, are brought into the project ahead of final decisions about site, program, and budget. As such, we help in determining these factors and in removing significant constraints ahead of design.

– Design becomes an instrument of fund-raising.

SIDE G1

SIDE G2

SIDE H1

– Design and construction schedules are negatively affected by fundraising and donation schedules.

– When communities are involved (and it is not always the case that they are), their members tend to defer to us as ‘experts’ more than regular clients do.

– It is generally accepted that the uniqueness of the social situations addressed by NGOs warrants unique social solutions and therefore unique design solutions.

However, international partners tend to be more comfortable with replicated solutions and with stereotypes of ‘local architecture.’

– In general, however, NGOs want their projects to transcend immediate context. They want to stand out and to strategically displace accepted social and architectural norms.

– The degree to which architects can play a role in this effort depends on the degree of their ‘aesthetic autonomy’—their ability to operate outside of the constraints of context and inherited forms and to provide original expression to emerging audiences.

In this strategic autonomy lies the key to effective social engagement.

– Program, budget, and design tend to constantly change based primarily on targeted donors.

SIDE H2

SIDE I1

SIDE I2

ELEVATIONS

Text originally posted by Hashim Sarkis on October 26th, 2010, regarding MoMA’s exhibition, Small Scale, Big Change. http://www.moma.org/explore/inside_out/2010/10/26/autonomy-as-engagement

148

Hashim

Interviewed by José Mayoral & Florencia Rodriguez

Where the contingent meets the transcendent On a summer afternoon in Cambridge, we arrived at Hashim Sarkis Studios to talk about the production of this practice. We found ourselves in a very comfortable and welcoming atmosphere in which engaging in sensible discussions about ideas, forms, and disciplinary concerns of all kinds seemed to be a natural part of an everyday agenda.

SOCIAL ENGAGEMENT

Florencia Rodriguez While preparing this conversation and the Ness.docs publication, we read many of your texts and were particularly taken by one comment you made in relation to the exhibition, Small Scale, Big Change at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) a couple of years ago. You pointed out that it exposed “the fallacy of opposing architecture’s autonomy to its social engagement,” and I think that statement is fundamental to your way of understanding architecture. Could you expand on this?

Hashim Sarkis The MoMA exhibition happened during a time of recession; it was 2010, and it happened at a time when everybody was saying, “well, architecture and design have been in the service of the rich and now there is a recession, there is a whole world that is struggling and we are not being attentive to the questions of social and economic development.” Since I was engaged in that kind of work, I was chosen for the MoMA exhibition along with eleven other practices.

state. Through this exhibition, MoMA was returning to the idea that architecture could play a larger social role even if the welfare state may no longer be the client of such undertakings. It was a truly transformative exhibition. However, I felt there was something inaccurate in the discussions and debates that followed the exhibition and that tended to polarize between an architecture for the rich and an architecture for the poor. I never thought that one would have a different approach, or a different attitude, or produce different results when working for different clients. I have always thought that architecture had a transformative role in society, that its political message or political role had to do with the fact that it did not replicate the social norms that it was happening within, it proposed alternatives. Therefore, every project could be proposing alternatives to the way we live. And, at another level, distinguishing between a role that we play towards low-income communities or underrepresented groups, saying that we play two different roles for two different client types, seemed unethical. I have only one architectural disposition.

I felt that MoMA was going back to the origins of Modern Architecture in terms of how architects were working with the welfare state. The welfare state brought largescale projects such as housing and infrastructure to the architects. The client changed from the rich patron to the state. Architecture became the instrument of the welfare

The essay that I wrote for the MoMA website also argued that engagement doesn’t mean that you immerse yourself fully in the process and you give in to everything, that you make architecture transparent to every need. Engagement means that you have to propose alternatives and it is in architecture’s deliberate detachment from the

Sarkis

Photographs: Pablo Gerson

Studios

148

Hashim

Interviewed by José Mayoral & Florencia Rodriguez

Where the contingent meets the transcendent On a summer afternoon in Cambridge, we arrived at Hashim Sarkis Studios to talk about the production of this practice. We found ourselves in a very comfortable and welcoming atmosphere in which engaging in sensible discussions about ideas, forms, and disciplinary concerns of all kinds seemed to be a natural part of an everyday agenda.

SOCIAL ENGAGEMENT

Florencia Rodriguez While preparing this conversation and the Ness.docs publication, we read many of your texts and were particularly taken by one comment you made in relation to the exhibition, Small Scale, Big Change at The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) a couple of years ago. You pointed out that it exposed “the fallacy of opposing architecture’s autonomy to its social engagement,” and I think that statement is fundamental to your way of understanding architecture. Could you expand on this?

Hashim Sarkis The MoMA exhibition happened during a time of recession; it was 2010, and it happened at a time when everybody was saying, “well, architecture and design have been in the service of the rich and now there is a recession, there is a whole world that is struggling and we are not being attentive to the questions of social and economic development.” Since I was engaged in that kind of work, I was chosen for the MoMA exhibition along with eleven other practices.

state. Through this exhibition, MoMA was returning to the idea that architecture could play a larger social role even if the welfare state may no longer be the client of such undertakings. It was a truly transformative exhibition. However, I felt there was something inaccurate in the discussions and debates that followed the exhibition and that tended to polarize between an architecture for the rich and an architecture for the poor. I never thought that one would have a different approach, or a different attitude, or produce different results when working for different clients. I have always thought that architecture had a transformative role in society, that its political message or political role had to do with the fact that it did not replicate the social norms that it was happening within, it proposed alternatives. Therefore, every project could be proposing alternatives to the way we live. And, at another level, distinguishing between a role that we play towards low-income communities or underrepresented groups, saying that we play two different roles for two different client types, seemed unethical. I have only one architectural disposition.

I felt that MoMA was going back to the origins of Modern Architecture in terms of how architects were working with the welfare state. The welfare state brought largescale projects such as housing and infrastructure to the architects. The client changed from the rich patron to the state. Architecture became the instrument of the welfare

The essay that I wrote for the MoMA website also argued that engagement doesn’t mean that you immerse yourself fully in the process and you give in to everything, that you make architecture transparent to every need. Engagement means that you have to propose alternatives and it is in architecture’s deliberate detachment from the

Sarkis

Photographs: Pablo Gerson

Studios

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Stan Allen

Scale Discussion:

I would suggest that the most convincing piece of built Landscape Urbanism to date is Michael Manfredi and Marion Weiss’s Olympic Sculpture Park. The urbanistic and infrastructural power of that project derives in part from their expertise as architects. Jim Corner recently Iectured at Princeton, and Jeff Kipnis observed—correctly in my view—that the strength of the projects he showed flowed from his expertise as a landscape architect. Transitions of material and texture, the staging of views, the choreography of movement, the play between artificial and natural: these are all landscape tropes. It is not that architects cannot learn from them, but it is still useful to distinguish two distinct areas of expertise.

So the motivation to look at landform building arises from an attempt to recapture some of these Iandscape effects as specifically architectural. A corollary to that is an implicit critique of the interdisciplinary claims of Landscape Urbanism.

Hashim Sarkis The rhetoric of Landscape Urbanism tends to overemphasize the straddling of disciplinary turf. It tends to prescribe the tools ahead of the solutions. It also under‐ emphasizes the specificity of the solution in favor of the systems that make up the solution. I say this with some reluctance because there are by now so many versions

of Landscape Urbanism, some of which are quite incompatible with one another, that it is difficult to label them all as one thing. This is a structural problem for any position that tries to be so inclusive.

SA I’d also like to suggest that Landscape Urbanism is a very American phenomenon, that is to say, one wedded to decentralization. The condition of the American city was always field‐like and horizontal, porous to nature. So in one sense you could say that Landscape Urbanism arises out of the difficulty of fitting the patterns of the American city into the inherited theories of urbanism, almost all of which had their origins in the European city: Colin Rowe’s Collage City, the rationalism of Aldo Rossi and Leon Krier—even New Urbanism holds on to the European idea of the compact, bounded city. The extended horizontal urbanism of the prairie was an exception to the ‘normal science’ of urban design. You could say that almost from the beginning, the American city was a Landscape Urbanism phenomenon.

The flip side of this is that it is difficult to export Landscape Urbanism. I mean, it’s almost impossible to think of Landscape Urbanism in the Asian context, for example.

How could Landscape Urbanism possibly stand up to the brutality of the Asian city as it is currently constructed?

HS The density factor of Landscape Urbanism...

Kenneth Frampton How I painted myself into the corner of Landscape Urbanism and megaform has to do with two projects which made an impact on me in 1992. I had the privilege of curating a Rothschild seminar in Jerusalem, and I had the notion of asking a landscape architect to this event. I invited Peter Walker, and he showed this IBM campus in Solana, West Texas. The seminar was published under the title Technology, Place, and Architecture. I thought that with that title I could invite architects who speak to that theme simply by speaking about their work. I was

Kenneth Frampton

PASSION FRUIT JUICE FACTORY MODEL – HASHIM SARKIS STUDIOS / PH. PABLO GERSON

Stan Allen I arrived at the subject of landform building by way of Landscape Urbanism. My collaborations with Jim Corner and involvement with Landscape Urbanism were very important to me, and—I hope—continue to be important to the field, but I also think it has reached something of a limit point. Landscape Urbanism is now more than ten years old: Charles Waldheim first coined the term in 1998. We can now look back over a decade that has produced a persuasive literature and some compelling propositions. The built projects of Landscape Urbanism, however, have for the most part been urban parks: in other words, they still function within the realm of landscape and have not yet been able to engage the urban or the architectural in a consequential way.

&

Hashim Sarkis

174

Scale Discussion:

I would suggest that the most convincing piece of built Landscape Urbanism to date is Michael Manfredi and Marion Weiss’s Olympic Sculpture Park. The urbanistic and infrastructural power of that project derives in part from their expertise as architects. Jim Corner recently Iectured at Princeton, and Jeff Kipnis observed—correctly in my view—that the strength of the projects he showed flowed from his expertise as a landscape architect. Transitions of material and texture, the staging of views, the choreography of movement, the play between artificial and natural: these are all landscape tropes. It is not that architects cannot learn from them, but it is still useful to distinguish two distinct areas of expertise.

So the motivation to look at landform building arises from an attempt to recapture some of these Iandscape effects as specifically architectural. A corollary to that is an implicit critique of the interdisciplinary claims of Landscape Urbanism.

Hashim Sarkis The rhetoric of Landscape Urbanism tends to overemphasize the straddling of disciplinary turf. It tends to prescribe the tools ahead of the solutions. It also under‐ emphasizes the specificity of the solution in favor of the systems that make up the solution. I say this with some reluctance because there are by now so many versions

of Landscape Urbanism, some of which are quite incompatible with one another, that it is difficult to label them all as one thing. This is a structural problem for any position that tries to be so inclusive.

SA I’d also like to suggest that Landscape Urbanism is a very American phenomenon, that is to say, one wedded to decentralization. The condition of the American city was always field‐like and horizontal, porous to nature. So in one sense you could say that Landscape Urbanism arises out of the difficulty of fitting the patterns of the American city into the inherited theories of urbanism, almost all of which had their origins in the European city: Colin Rowe’s Collage City, the rationalism of Aldo Rossi and Leon Krier—even New Urbanism holds on to the European idea of the compact, bounded city. The extended horizontal urbanism of the prairie was an exception to the ‘normal science’ of urban design. You could say that almost from the beginning, the American city was a Landscape Urbanism phenomenon.

The flip side of this is that it is difficult to export Landscape Urbanism. I mean, it’s almost impossible to think of Landscape Urbanism in the Asian context, for example.

How could Landscape Urbanism possibly stand up to the brutality of the Asian city as it is currently constructed?

HS The density factor of Landscape Urbanism...

Kenneth Frampton How I painted myself into the corner of Landscape Urbanism and megaform has to do with two projects which made an impact on me in 1992. I had the privilege of curating a Rothschild seminar in Jerusalem, and I had the notion of asking a landscape architect to this event. I invited Peter Walker, and he showed this IBM campus in Solana, West Texas. The seminar was published under the title Technology, Place, and Architecture. I thought that with that title I could invite architects who speak to that theme simply by speaking about their work. I was

Kenneth Frampton

PASSION FRUIT JUICE FACTORY MODEL – HASHIM SARKIS STUDIOS / PH. PABLO GERSON

Stan Allen I arrived at the subject of landform building by way of Landscape Urbanism. My collaborations with Jim Corner and involvement with Landscape Urbanism were very important to me, and—I hope—continue to be important to the field, but I also think it has reached something of a limit point. Landscape Urbanism is now more than ten years old: Charles Waldheim first coined the term in 1998. We can now look back over a decade that has produced a persuasive literature and some compelling propositions. The built projects of Landscape Urbanism, however, have for the most part been urban parks: in other words, they still function within the realm of landscape and have not yet been able to engage the urban or the architectural in a consequential way.

Stan Allen

&

Hashim Sarkis

Florencia Rodriguez flor@lotsofarchitecture.com

Published in 2017 by Lots of Architecture Publishers

EDITORS AT LARGE FOR NESS.DOCS 1

José Mayoral Felipe Vera

CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER

Pablo Gerson pablo@lotsofarchitecture.com

EDITORS FOR NESS.DOCS 1

Daniela Freiberg Federico Liberati Florencia Medina

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, distributed or transmitted in any form or any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publishers.

PHOTO EDITOR

Mariam Samur

CONTRIBUTING EDITOR FROM HSS

Andre Malan

DESIGN DIRECTOR

Diego Valiña teoriaypractica.com

All project credits provided by Hashim Sarkis Studios.

PROOFREADER

Lisa Ubelaker Andrade

© 2017 Lots of Architecture, LLC

TEXTS BY

Stan Allen Angelo Bucci Kenneth Frampton Fabrizio Gallanti Pablo Gerson Gabriel Kozlowski José Mayoral Luca Molinari Florencia Rodriguez Hashim Sarkis Nader Tehrani Felipe Vera

1680 Michigan Ave. Floor 10 / Suite 1000 Miami Beach, FL 33139 Tel: +1 (617) 674-2656 hello@lotsofarchitecture.com www.lotsofarchitecture.com

PHOTOGRAPHERS

Joumana Arab Wissam Chaaya Pablo Gerson Roland Halbe Florencia Rodriguez Javier Agustín Rojas Jonathan Scelsa Jean Yasmine

COVER PHOTOGRAPH

Pablo Gerson

We care about cultural producers and the acknowledgement of the works and images here presented. We apologize for any errors or omissions.

ISSN 2574-8343 Printed in the U.S.

We are very proud to introduce Lots of Architecture with the first issue of our monographic series, dedicated to the work and thoughts of Hashim Sarkis Studios. One of our aims as a publisher is to serve as a magnifying glass, amplifying valuable practices and modes of thought that contribute positively to the disciplinary state of the arts, advocating for the transforming capabilities of design and architecture.

We believe this editorial piece is a perfect opportunity to reflect upon the fact that, beyond Sarkis’s brilliant and renowned academic career, his body of work in architecture constitutes a committed—and singularly brave—project.

5

Foreword.

Pablo Gerson & Florencia Rodriguez.

6

Understanding a Reflective Practice: Drawing the Third Line.

José Mayoral & Felipe Vera.

9

CYANOMETRICS Text – Hashim Sarkis.

26

PROJECTS 29 42 47 63 69 81 101 105 113 125

-NESS.docs is a product of Lots of Architecture: an editorial platform dedicated to Architecture, Life and Urban Culture founded by Pablo Gerson and Florencia Rodriguez in 2017.

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Co-edited by Lots of Architecture with José Mayoral and Felipe Vera

www.nessmagazine.com

On architecture, life and urban culture

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Balloon Landing Park.

— The Politics of Play. Nader Tehrani.

Housing for the Fishermen.

— Autonomy as Engagement. Hashim Sarkis.

Daily Mosque.

Town Hall & Park.

— For a Tectonic of Megaliths. Hashim Sarkis.

Float Pavilion.

Watermelon Landscape.

Courtowers.

DIALOGUES 148 The NESS.docs Interview: Hashim Sarkis Studios.

Where the contingent meets the transcendent.

José Mayoral & Florencia Rodriguez.

160

A Conversation between Angelo Bucci & Hashim Sarkis.

Hashim Sarkis, meanings and unfoldings of a visit to São Paulo.

Angelo Bucci.

174

Scale Discussion.

Stan Allen, Kenneth Frampton & Hashim Sarkis.

PORTFOLIO FINAL SEQUENCE

Hashim Sarkis Studios 1998—2017

Coedited by: Lots of Architecture publishers, José Mayoral & Felipe Vera.

Texts by: Stan Allen, Angelo Bucci, Kenneth Frampton, Fabrizio Gallanti, Pablo Gerson, Gabriel Kozlowski, José Mayoral, Luca Molinari, Florencia Rodriguez, Hashim Sarkis, Nader Tehrani & Felipe Vera.

US$ 20.00

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Hashim Sarkis Studios

EDITOR IN CHIEF

Hashim Sarkis Studios has worked in rural and urban locations ranging from the United States to the Middle East in the fields of landscape, urban design and mixed-use, institutional and residential architecture.

In their nearly 20 years of practice, Hashim Sarkis Studios’ work has received numerous awards, has been extensively published, and has exhibited widely.

Sarkis is also the Dean of the School of Architecture + Planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a position he has held since 2014. From 1995 to 2014 he was on the faculty of the Harvard University Graduate School of Design.