QUOTIDIAN ARCHITECTURES
Venice Biennale 12.International Architecture Exhibition: Hong Kong in Venice
ORGANIZING INSTITUTIONS
The Hong Kong Institute of Architects
Hong Kong Arts Development Council
COORDINATOR IN VENICE
Arte Communications
OPENING DAYS
Opening Period: August 27th – November 21st 2010
VENUE
Arsenale, Campo della Tana, Castello 2126, 30122 Venice
EXHIBITORS
davidclovers + C.E.B. Reas; Map Office + Sun Hing Industries; Urban Rethink Tank + Craig Au Yeung; Joshua Bolchover, John Lin + HKU CPW + Kadoorie Farm; Hong Kong Housing Authority + Michael Wolf; Ocean.CN + CAD + Rocker-Lange Architects; William Lim + Philip Yung; Adam Frampton, Jonathan Solomon, Clara Wong + Clean Air Network; Rocco Design + HKICC School of Creativity; OMA + Chu Hai College; Urbis + MET Studio + Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust; RAD + Greg Girard; WKCDA + Foster and Partners, OMA, Rocco Design
CHIEF CURATOR
Juan Du
CURATORIAL TEAM
Mary Chan
Margherita Errante
Giulia Foscari
Chad McKee
CURATORIAL STATEMENT
Inspired by the Chinese colloquial phrase for the necessities of daily life, 衣食住行 (Clothing-Food-Dwelling-Transport), we ask architects, artists, activists, educators, industrialists, and governmental agencies to re-imagine and expand on the simple choices we make every day. The ‘Quotidian Architectures’ exhibition explores the potential of design to create socially and environmentally responsible architectures through presenting collaborative and cross-disciplinary projects from Hong Kong. What we wear, what we eat, where we live, how we travel, what we learn, how we relax – decisions we make every day as individual inhabitants collectively contribute to the overall environment and lasting well-being of the city.
Hong Kong is a diverse and complex city where acute physical constraints have created extreme urban forms and inspired inventive architectural solutions for the basic needs of city life. The ‘Quotidian Architectures’ exhibition reveals Hong Kong’s unique challenges and proposes possible solutions for dense urban settlements around the world. Projects that investigate and utilize design to engage the urban environment from all levels and aspects of daily life will represent the creative fields of Hong Kong in this year’s Venice Biennale. Clothing, Food, Dwelling, Transport, Education and Leisure - six categories of exhibits form the core of the exhibition. In each exhibit installation, architects work in partnership with sustainability-oriented practitioners to generate a project demonstrating the potential and necessity of collaborative design thinking.
‘Quotidian Architectures’ aims to generate debates on current architectural designs for sustainable development and recognizes the urban environment as a complex eco-system comprised not simply of natural resources, but also of social communities, economic operations, and cultural practices. Architecture is not a tree; architectural design thinking must venture beyond technological applications and surface plantings to include crucial social considerations, cultural identities, and behavior patterns of the residents of the built environment. Designers should recognize the daily rhythms of our environments to better engage the ecology of the city and hence create responsible and sustainable architectures.
There are three phases of ‘Quotidian Architectures’ exhibition starting with the Venice Biennale 12th International Architecture Exhibition: Hong Kong in Venice, followed by the Response Exhibition in Hong Kong at the end of the year, and concluding with a Traveling Exhibition in six cities in Mainland China. The staging forms a continuous and active platform of working collaborations between sustainable development practitioners, architectural professionals, and exhibition visitors in Italy and China. The exhibitions present opportunities to explore and share the contributions that design should bring to those building and living within the architectures of our city. After all, people meet in architecture.
Juan Du
Chief Curator
LOCATION MAP
1 2010 HONG KONG IN VENICE (Quotidian Architectures Venue)
2 ENTRANCE TO THE ARSENALE (Biennale Architecture Exhibitions Site)
3 GIARDINI PUBBLICI (Biennale Architecture National Pavilions)
EXHIBITION SITE
1 2010 HONG KONG IN VENICE (Quotidian Architectures Venue)
2 ENTRANCE TO THE ARSENALE (Biennale Architecture Exhibitions Site)
FLOOR PLAN
1 Clad
2 Underwear
3 Open Rice Box
4 Rural-Urban Ecology
5 Harmon-i-City
6 Serial Systems
7 Elastic Streetscape
8 Thermallmeter
9 Creative Learning
10 Concentrated Campus
11 The Landscape of Wetland Park
12 Demolition As Construction
SP Hong Kong Arts: Imagining the Future
EXHIBITION INFORMATION
EXHIBITION LIST
CLOTHING 1 Clad
davidclovers + C.E.B. Reas
2 UNDERWEAR : Les dessous de la Biennale
Map Office + Sun Hing Industries
FOOD 3 Open Rice Box 开.反.合.
Urban Rethink Tank + Craig Au Yeung
4 Rural-Urban Ecology
Joshua Bolchover, John Lin + HKU CPW + Kadoorie Farm
DWELLING 5 Harmon-i-City
Hong Kong Housing Authority + Michael Wolf
6 Serial Systems
Ocean.CN + CAD + Rocker-Lange Architects
TRANSPORT 7 Elastic Streetscape
William Lim + Philip Yung
8 Thermallmeter
Adam Frampton, Jonathan Solomon, Clara Wong + Clean Air Network
EDUCATION 9 Creative Learning
Rocco Design Architects + HKICC School of Creativity
10 Concentrated Campus
Office for Metropolitan Architecture + Chu Hai College
LEISURE 11 The Landscape of Wetland Park
Urbis Ltd + MET Studio + Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust
12 Demolition as Construction
RAD + Greg Girard
Special Project
SP Hong Kong Arts: Imagining the Future
West Kowloon Cultural District Authority + Foster and Partners,
Office for Metropolitan Architecture, Rocco Design Architects
CLOTHING 1 Clad
davidclovers + C.E.B. Reas
Qipao, the quitessential garment of the 1950s Hong Kong, is tailor made to fit the body – exemplary of all tailors’ challenge in transforming a two-dimensional medium into three-dimensional form. While the curtain wall is the architectural equivalent of the Qipao in itstautness and tension, Ronchamp epitomes the opposite spectrum, where the poche mediates between the interior space and the exterior form. The installation proposal – CLAD – seeks to reinvigorate ideas of enclosure through material explorations. Working in collaboration with artist C.E.B. Reas, this proposal will show multiple variations of cladding that are immured with light and texture.
CLOTHING 2 UNDERWEAR : Les dessous de la Biennale
Map Office + Sun Hing Industries
The “Underwear” project challenges the most basic piece of clothing – the undergarment. Made with innovative fabrics from Sun Hing Industries Holding Ltd, the “Underwear” is environmentally-sensitive, sustainable, low-impact and recycled. Sun Hing Industry received one of three Hang Seng Pearl River Delta Environmental Awards and the Category Award for Water Management. For the 12th Venice Biennale, MAP OFFICE has designed a unique pattern that features twisting elements of motion derived from the surface of water. This design is central in reminding us of the universal importance of water in our eco-system.
FOOD 3 Open Rice Box
Urban Rethink Tank + Craig Au Yeung
“Open Rice Box” takes on the copious blend of sensory and spatial experiences generated by Hong Kong’s grassroots food culture- preparing, serving, and consuming food according to convenience( speed), combination (customizable dishes), comfort (sustenance). Inspired by the ubiquitous foodstuff container box and associated foldable equipments, our exhibit reconfigures categories structuring the emotional power of food: colour –image (色), smell-opacity(香), taste- texture(味). A series of designed “container – box” modules is made from weather-resistant Chiptec boards ( literally recycled beverage cartons) that can be maneuvered – opened (开), flipped (反), closed (合)– as well as tessellated into assemblages integrating seat, table, worktop, stall.
FOOD 4 Rural-Urban Ecology
Joshua Bolchover, John Lin +
HKU CPW + Kadoorie Farm
In China’s recent urban transformation, urban processes are intertwined with rural processes to the extent that the rural is a key agent in the creation of urban fabric. The project presented here involve intensive collaboration between Hong Kong based charities and donors, private developers, local PRC village officials, Mainland universities as well as the government Ministries of Education and Construction. Each project has a strong programmatic idea, an environmental concern and a material strategy that is based on locally sourced inexpensive materials. These projects form new linkages between HK and the mainland: architecture is the mechanism for people to not only meet but to form an active network working to transform poor, rural areas of China.
DWELLING 5 Harmon-i-City
Hong Kong Housing Authority + Michael Wolf
With an average density of over 6,300 people per square kilometer, high–rise urban living is synonymous with Hong Kong habitat, making the city one of the most compact in the world. Through the lens of Michael Wolf’s “points of view” still pictures were captured of people in confined internal living spaces (Inside) as well as repetitive, building facades (Outside) which are common place in Hong Kong’s residential architecture-scape. Providing “links” to contrast the density and complexity one may find in Wolf’s images, HKHA illustrates its efforts to provide People quality homes in compact, yet harmonized communities within the city of Hong Kong by means of micro-climate studies, community engagement and collective memory
DWELLING 6 Serial Systems
Ocean.CN + CAD +
Rocker-Lange Architects
Mass-production housing has always been informed by contemporary technologies and, housing has often been the trigger for innovations to existing processes of production. A central question to be addressed in this project is how contemporary computational design tools, CAD-CAM fabrication and existing constructional techniques and material assemblages can contribute to generate new experimental prototypes for twenty-first century living. Confronting the crisis of repetitive models of housing, this project will engage with an alternative, differentiated model of housing across three scales – from urbanism, to architectural typologies, and more detailed building systems.
TRANSPORT 7 Elastic Streetscape
William Lim + Philip Yung
A street that is folded away every night, and unfolded the next morning into the most active street market in Hong Kong, accommodating a tram to come through every few minutes with the crowds giving way to allow the tram to squeeze by, Chun Yeung Street demonstrates a perfect scene of 衣食住行in an elastic, breathing city. Merchants through their ingenuity have developed a system of vernacular architecture components for them to conduct business on this elastic street. Basic utilitarian and survival instinct dictate the forms and break down the components in a kit of parts that consists of points, lines and planes to defend and claim a territory.
TRANSPORT 8 Thermallmeter
Adam Frampton, Jonathan Solomon,
Clara Wong + Clean Air Network
Thermallmeter is a mapping of the continuous pedestrian spaces of Hong Kong’s integrated transportation and shopping mall networks. Comprising tunnels, bridges, open decks, partially covered footbridges and a variety of building interiors, this seamless network is in fact host to a variety of different environment that, while often privately owned and operated, serve as the de facto public space of the city. Thermallmeter codes the gradation of environmental indicators on solid casts of the void spaces of the network. Thermallmeter serves to raise awareness of air quality and thermal comfort in association with malls and infrastructure in the city, and explores the impact that the ambient environment has on public spaces.
EDUCATION 9 Creative Learning
Rocco Design Architects +
HKICC School of Creativity
The HKICC School of Creativity is conceived not just as a work of architecture, but as a spatial setting from which the process of learning in various modes derives its energy. The conception of the architecture is a collaborative process between the architects and the School, who has a unique vision of a secondary school education that emphasizes the humanities and the creative arts. The design is therefore about accommodating and stimulating creativity. Spaces are created to be transformed, surfaces to be meddled with,and the users are expected to carry on with the spirit of design suggested by the architecture, continuing that process of its collaboration with a creative education beyond the completion of the physical structure.
EDUCATION 10 Concentrated Campus
Office for Metropolitan Architecture +
Chu Hai College
The new educational model developed for Chu Hai College is based on the interaction of different disciplines. The design concentrates the whole program into a Compact Campus Building where the relationships between the various departments are reinforced through spatial and visual connections. The traditional notion of enclosure that begins with a sealed outer layer is deconstructed. Instead, the enclosure is defined by layers of in-between spaces that open and close,--buffering the environment and reducing the volume of conditioned space. The building forms create a passively shaded environment while leaving most of the site free as a natural landscape environment.
LEISURE 11 The Landscape of Wetland Park
Urbis Ltd + MET Studio +
Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust
The Hong Kong Wetland Park is a prime example of harmony with nature, environmental practice and sustainable development; unique to Hong Kong; seeking to provide equally for the potentially conflicting functions of conservation, tourism, education and recreation. The Park has provided thousands of conservation educational activities to school students and hosted international conferences. Visitors can enjoy the park and begin to learn to be stewards, not just of this development but also of their overall environment.
LEISURE 12 Demolition as Construction
RAD + Greg Girard
In early 1990’s, Greg Girard & Ian Lambort published the book “ The City of Darkness” on the in Kowloon Walled City in Hong Kong. As the project for his graduation thesis, Aaron Tan documen demolition of the walled city and uncovered the organic evolution of architecture through stud sections. Today, 17 years later, Aaron and his team at RAD collaborate with Greg Girard and hi Emmy Lung, to revisit the project from a new perspective. For this Biennale, the team revisited th which is now a park, and also interviewed the ex-residents of the walled city, in particular, those were interviewed 20 years ago.
SPECIAL PROJECT SP Hong Kong Arts: Imagining the Future
West Kowloon Cultural District Authority +
Foster and Partners,
Office for Metropolitan Architecture,
Rocco Design Architects
EXHIBITORS INFORMATION
Exhibit Title: Clad
davidclovers
Founded by David Erdman and Clover Lee in 2007
Based in Hong Kong S.AR., China
www.davidclovers.com
C.E.B. Reas
Born in Ohio, USA, in 1972
Lives and works in Los Angeles, California, USA
www.reas.com
Exhibit Title: UNDERWEAR : Les dessous de la Biennale
Map Office
Founded by Laurent Gutierrez and Valérie Portefaix in 1997
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.map-office.com
Sun Hing Industries Holding Ltd
Founded by Kwok-Po Cheung in 1974
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.shltd.com
Exhibit Title: Open Rice Box
Urban Rethink Tank
Founded by Martin Fung and Thomas Chung in 2008
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.urbanrethinktank.asia
Craig Au Yeung
Born in Hong Kong in 1963
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.auyeungishere.com
Exhibit Title: Rural-Urban Ecology
Joshua Bolchover
Born in Manchester, UK, in 1974
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
John Lin
Born in Dajia, Taiwan, in 1975
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
Community Project Workshop, Faculty of Architecture, University of Hong Kong
Founded by the Faculty of Architecture in 2009
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
Kadoorie Farm & Botanic Garden
Founded by Lawrence and Horace Kadoorie in 1956
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.kfbg.org
Exhibit Title: Harmon-i-City
Hong Kong Housing Authority
Founded by Hong Kong Government in 1973
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.housingauthority.gov.hk
Michael Wolf
Born in Munich, Germany, in 1954
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.photomichaelwolf.com
Exhibit Title: Serial Systems
Ocean Consultancy Network
Founded by Tom Verbes and Gao Yan in 2008
Based in Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Jakarta, London
www.ocean-consultancy-network.com
C:A+D - Carlow Architecture and Design
Founded by Jason Carlow in 2007
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.carlow-ad.com
Rocker-Lange Architects
Founded by Ingeborg M. Rocker and Christian Lange in 2006
Based in Boston, USA, and Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.rocker-lange.com
Exhibit Title: Elastic Streetscape
William Lim
Born in Hong Kong in 1957
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.CL3.com
Philip Yung
Born in Hong Kong in 1979
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
Exhibit Title: Thermallmeter
Adam Snow Frampton
Born in Washington DC, USA, in 1980
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
Jonathan Solomon
Born in Chicago, IL, USA, in 1978
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
Clara Kar Wing Wong
Born in Hong Kong in 1983
Lives and works in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
Clean Air Network
Founded by Joanne Ooi in 2009
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.hongkongcan.org
Exhibit Title: Creative Learning
Rocco Design Architects Ltd
Founded by Rocco S.K. Yim, Bernard M.B. Hui, Patrick P.W. Lee in 1982
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.rocco.hk
HKICC Lee Shau Kee School of Creativity
Founded by Hong Kong Institute of Contemporary Culture in 2006
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.creativehk.edu.hk
Exhibit Title: Concentrated Campus
The Office for Metropolitan Architecture
Founded by Rem Koolhaas, Eliza and Zoe Zenghelis, and Madelon Vriesendrop in 1975
Based in Rotterdam, New York, Beijing and Hong Kong
www.oma.eu
Chu Hai College of Higher Education
Founded in 1949
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.chuhai.edu.hk
Exhibit Title: The Landscape of Wetland Park
Urbis Ltd
Founded by Peter Cookson Smith in 1977
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.urbis.com.hk
MET Studio Design
Founded by Alex McCuaig in 1982
Based in London and Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.metstudio.com
Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust (Consulting) Ltd
Founded by Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust in 1989
Based in Slimbridge, Gloucestershire, UK
www.wwtconsulting.co.uk
Exhibit Title: Demolition as Construction
RAD
Fonded by Aaron Tan in 1994
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.rad-dar.com
Greg Girard
Born in Vancouver, Canada, in 1955
Lives and works in Shanghai, China
www.greggirard.com
Exhibit Title: Hong Kong Arts: Imagining the Future
West Kowloon Cultural District Authority
Established under the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority Ordinance in 2008
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.wkcda.hk
Foster + Partners
Founded by Norman Foster in 1967
Based in London, Abu Dhabi, Hong Kong, Madrid, New York
www.fosterandpartners.com
The Office for Metropolitan Architecture
Founded by Rem Koolhaas, Eliza and Zoe Zenghelis, and Madelon Vriesendrop in 1975
Based in Rotterdam, New York, Beijing and Hong Kong
www.oma.eu
Rocco Design Architects Ltd
Founded by Rocco S.K. Yim, Bernard M.B. Hui, Patrick P.W. Lee in 1982
Based in Hong Kong S.A.R., China
www.rocco.hk
CURATORS INFORMATION
JUAN DU is the founder of Hong Kong-based architecture office IDU_Architecture and an Assistant Professor in Architecture at the University of Hong Kong. Her professional and academic work engages the architectural field from the extents of built forms to the social and ecological processes of the city. Her work has been internationally exhibited including the Venice Biennale 11th International Architecture Exhibition, 2009 Vienna Architekturzentrum Wonderland Exhibition and 2007 & 2009 Shenzhen Hong Kong Biennale of Architecture Urbanism\Architecture. Her research, design projects and writings on architecture and the city have been published in China, Europe and the United States. Her past professional experience involves working in the offices of Yung Ho Chang Atelier FCJZ in China, Agence Santiago Calatrava and Atelier Seraji in France, and Mack Scogin Merrill Elam Architects in the United States. Prior to arriving at Hong Kong University, she taught at the Department of Architecture at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and at the Graduate Center of Architecture at Peking University. Juan Du holds a Master of Architecture degree from Princeton University and a Bachelor degree of Design in Architecture from the University of Florida with Highest Honors. She is the recipient of a United States Fulbright Foundation Fellowship for research on the transformations of the contemporary Chinese city.
MARY CHAN founded the home-grown Hong Kong publishing house MCCM Creations in January 2001. She has a combined professional background in magazine publishing, arts administration, marketing, advertising, and management. Chan has worked in Hong Kong and Mainland China with non-profit art & culture organizations, multi-national advertising agencies, and US pharmaceutical and healthcare companies, including: the Asiaweek English magazine, Hong Kong Festival Fringe, Saatchi & Saatchi Advertising, J Walter Thompson China, Shanghai Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Ltd. With a passion for art and culture from her childhood, Chan attempts to carefully integrate words, visual arts, and graphic design elements into distinctive book projects. Her hope is to communicate with a wider overseas and local readership, celebrating the uniqueness & creativity of the individual creators and voices of Hong Kong.
MARGHERITA ERRANTE is an Italian scholar of Chinese language and culture and works as a writer, photographer and producer. She was educated in Paris, London, and Beijing and speaks five languages. From 1999 to 2003 she lived and worked in several Chinese cities and in 2004 she moved to an indigenous village in the Sino-Burmese jungle to conduct anthropological research on the Wa minority people. In March 2005 she organized a personal photographic exhibition in Italy and published a book whose proceeds were dedicated to the Wa village. Errante was chosen as photographer for a 2005 diplomatic Peace Mission sponsored by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In 2007 she returned to Beijing to study the development of China's contemporary architecture and in 2008 collaborated with Class CNBC TV as a Beijing correspondent. Errante is a member of the American Anthropological Association, she is the author of a Chinese Language Course published by DeAgostini Editore and writes about Architectural Anthropology. She now lives in Hong Kong where she founded Margotpolo Productions Ltd.
GIULIA FOSCARI is an Architect from Venice currently residing in Hong Kong. Over the past ten years Giulia has worked and/or collaborated with London based Zaha Hadid Architects, Foster & Partners, and the Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA). She has extensive research and exhibition experience globally and has participated twice in the Venice Architecture Biennale: in 2006 as exhibitor – presenting her research “From Favelas to Parametric Architecture” – and in 2008 as curator of the exhibition “Andrea Palladio and Zaha Hadid Architects”. She was educated at the Architecture University of Rome (Roma Tre) and at London’s Architectural Association (where she received the DRL March qualification) and is currently teaching at The University of Hong Kong.
CHAD MCKEE is a LEED Accredited Architect from New York City with over thirteen years of experience leading projects and research on environmentally responsive design. His professional experience includes leadership roles in the design and management of projects throughout Asia and the United States. Over the past decade he has worked and/or collaborated with several architecture practices, including: South Carolina-based Huff + Gooden Architects, New York City-based Fox and Fowle Architects, Platt Byard Dovell White Architects, Paris-based Renzo Piano Building Workshop, Amsterdam-based UN Studio, Hong Kong-based Integrated Design Associates and IDU Architecture. Chad McKee was educated in Italy and the United States and holds a Master of Architecture degree from The City College of New York. He is currently teaching at The University of Hong Kong.
EXHIBITION INFORMATION
2010 HKVB QUOTIDIAN ARCHITECTURES EXHIBITION
www.venicebiennale.hk/vb2010
VENICE BIENNALE OFFICIAL WEBSITE
www.labiennale.org
THE HONG KONG INSTITUTE OF ARCHITECTS
www.hkia.net
HONG KONG ARTS DEVELOPMENT COUNCIL
www.hkadc.org.hk