Tag Archives: exhibition

Glenn Murcutt – Architecture for Place

fredrickswhite2

The MFA in Helsinki currently is hosting an exhibition on the Australian Architect Glenn Murcutt. Architecture for Place shows off a selection of Murcutt’s projects through photos, drawings and models.

The drawings sometime blown up show all the stages of the design, ‘napkin’ sketches to working drawings. One of my favourite drawings is a page of sketchs and notes on a roof and details sent as a fax, dated and a ‘with love Glenn’ at the bottom. The models, all sectional have the sectional drawing attached to the back showing they are less concerned with an investigation of the spacial qualities of the building than of the way the materials are put together. Continue reading →

Finnish Architecture 0809

Finnish Architecture stages a Biennial Exhibition of the best in Finnish Architecture and this year 0809 starts its tour in Helsinki before going around the globe. It’s a good chance to look at some great projects, photos and models, step back and survey the progress made and the potential going forward. The exhibition catalogue this year also includes an essay from Peter MacKeith an American who was director of Architecture studies in Helsinki University during the mid to late 90′s summarising his views on the state of Finnish Architecture. He is a great writer and makes a thoughtful contribution here.

The Exhibition

Firstly unlike the previous three biennial exhibitions this one contains many housing projects, and some of them are actually quite good (slight irony intended). Churches and Schools which previously supplied the best projects are missing here. There is also a feeling that the judges consciously spread their net a lot wider this time. There is an electrical substation, some master plans and renovations so there is a wider cross section from the built environment, as a result it’s more relevant and larger in conceptual scope than before so thanks to the jurors for this.

Meklin Villa one of my favourites from the show

All this hasn’t brought the quality of the projects down, there are of course some outstanding projects here also which stand out from the crowd. Also the Architecture feels a bit more colourful and experimental. Overall this is a lovely exhibition.

Some notable examples are The Huvitus Housing Terrace, the Anttolanhovi  Villas, or Villa Meklin which is a notable addition to the many Archiapelago type summer houses which have often showcased the best of Scandinavian design over the years. Also The Swedish school and the Vellamo centre would not look out of place on any best of list over the last couple of years. So there is strength in breadth and depth here but some missed opportunities too.

Vellamo Boat museum photo by Jussi Tianen

Look at the Salmisaari masterplan and you will see the Architects really thought about opening up the development to its coastline and the public access running through. But if you visit the reality it comes up a little short. But missed opportunities are for the next time and even in Salmisaari so far a high standard has been achieved.

Looking Forward

I don’t want to get too much into the debate about how these exhibitions like the Sterling Prize for example can become divorced from the reality of building, that Architects congratulate each other on their fantastic work when their contribution is a only a part of the whole building and design process. Clearly here the line gets crossed a little but doesn’t invalidate the endeavour.  It also brings me to this wider issue of stepping back a moment and then looking forward to the future.  So what do these buildings tell us about the time and place we live in now? That the distance Finland has to travel to be comfortable in the multicultural and international stage is still a little way off but getting closer. A coherent approach to the environmental issues of today is also clearly lacking, the building industry as a whole here seems to be entirely devoid any approach at all to our times most pressing problem. A symptom I think of the general attitude to this problem as being an infrastructural issue and not having an Architectural remit, we will have to see how this continues to plays out.

The many strands of thinking ,attitudes,styles and new directions that continually inform and run through Architectural practice do not always reveal themselves in a small countries best work even over two years but there is much here to give us hope for an inventive future.

Below you will find a full list of the projects included in the exhibition and a KML file showing all the projects on a map.

  • Pasila Machine Workshop Area Blocks of Flats, Helsinki. Architects NRT Ltd
  • Blocks of Flats in Myllypuro, Helsinki. A6 Architects
  • Oscar Block of Flats, Helsinki. Tuomo Siitonen Architects
  • Terraced Housing in Vuosaari, Helsinki. Kirsi Korhonen and Mika Penttinen Architects
  • Villa Laulumaa, Oulainen. Anna and Lauri Louekari Architects
  • Anttolanhovi Lakeside Villas and Hillside Villas, Mikkeli. Emma Johansson Architects; Timo Leiviskä Architects
  • Villa Mecklin, Naantali. Huttunen–Lipasti–Pakkanen Architects
  • Loft G, Helsinki. ALA Architects Ltd
  • Kyly Sauna, Raseborg. Avanto Architects Ltd
  • Ajurinmäki Day-Care Centre, Espoo. AFKS
  • Tuomarila Day-Care Centre, Espoo. Auer & Sandås Architects ltd
  • Swedish School of Social Science, Conversion and New Building, Helsinki. Juha Leiviskä, Jari Heikkinen
  • Maritime Centre Vellamo, Kotka. Lahdelma & Mahlamäki Architects
  • Helsinki Seafarers’ Centre. Ark-House Architects ltd
  • Provincial Archives, Hämeenlinna. Heikkinen–Komonen Architects
  • Oulu City Offices. Sarc Architects Ltd
  • Salmisaari Detail Plan and Cityscape Plan, Helsinki. Helsinki City Plannig Department; B & M Architects Ltd and WSP Finland
  • Varma Offices, Helsinki. Tuomo Siitonen Architects
  • Salmisaarenaukio 1 Offices, Helsinki. Helin & Co Architects
  • National Board of Education, Renovation, Helsinki. Sarc Architects Ltd
  • Pori City Hall Restoration. Vilhelm Helander, Tytti Valto
  • Paulig Roastery, Helsinki. Tommila Architects Ltd
  • Finnish Wooden Boat Centre, Kotka. Lahdelma & Mahlamäki Architects
  • Open-Air Museum Conservation Centre, Helsinki. Häkli Architects
  • 110 kV Switching Substation, Helsinki. K2S Architects Ltd
  • Ekenäs Harbour Area, Raseborg. B&M Architects Ltd; WSP Finland Ltd

Previous exhibitions 0607

KML of all the projects 0809.

Ascending and Descending

The first showing of M.C.Escher in Finland is now at the Amos art gallery. With a film and most of Eschers best loved wood cuttings and prints on show it is a real treat. What I love about Escher is his play with dimensions. He shows with his illusions on the paper the difference between reality and its representation and he is able to incorporate the dimension of time into his pictures by defying reality, for example ascending and descending with its infinite stair loop.

Gombrich in his seminal book Art and Illusion showed how art moved from portraying reality ‘as it was’ to ‘how it appears’ and then in turn with the invention of photography and film moved away from the format of representation. But Escher by using the rules of perspective moves us to see the tricks behind the portrayal of space in Western art. He is playing both with us and with reality, and this makes him special indeed singular in the  art world.

I think there is much to learn from and be inspired by the ideas and implict demonstration by Escher of the inferiority of one sense alone in the understanding of space and I wish more of that thinking, that type of questioning, was present in our design culture at the moment.

Ola Kolehmainen at Kiasma


Ola Kolehmainen, member of the Helsinki School a loose collective of artists, has an exhibition on at Kiasma at the moment. His work consists of heavily cropped photos of Modern Architecture, that instantly abstracts them and concentrates the qualities of space, light and surface. What I like about the pictures in particular is that by forcing an abstracted view on the you Ola reveals details you wouldn’t otherwise see.

Click on the above image for a slideshow. (All photos are from Kiasma website and copyright Ola Kolehmainen.) A building is not a building at Kiasma 26.02.2009 – 26.04.2009

Helsinki Biennale 2008

Helsinki Biennale 2008 is going to be a World Fair. We have secretly built pavillions and all that shit in the cellar of Design Museum Helsinki. The World Fair will take place 25.10.2008–25.1.2009. It will be noisy, magnificent, and über gigantic. More than 50 most interesting artists from Finland and over 100 of our favorite artists from abroad. If sleep is the new black, Helsinki Biennale 2008 is wearing all white!

Aki-Pekka Sinikoski, Head of Helsinki Biennale

Finnish Pavillion 1900

The Finnish Pavillion at the 1900 Paris World Fair has been recreated digitally by the Media Lab at the University of Art and Design Helsinki (TaiK). The building was drawn by architects Eliel Saarinen, Herman Gesellius, and Armas Lindgren.

Wearing circular polarization glasses and using a mouse the visitor is able to access a space created using stereoscopic a display. The virtual model of the pavilion can be examined both inside and outside. Spatial sounds make the experience feel real, as if one would be moving inside a historical building. Inside the pavilion model there are digital three-dimensional replicas of some artifacts that were exhibited in Paris.

You can visit the virtual reconstruction in Helsinki in Design Museum Fennofolk – New Nordic Oddity exhibition during 11 June – 28 September 2008. Makes me wonder if there is an Uncanny Valley for immersive 3d visualisations. Its a certainly a step up from the Recreation of Aalto’s 1939 Pavillion which seems now to be offline.

Finnish Architecture 0607

Every two years the Museum of Finnish Architecture (MFA) puts on an exhibition of the best 25 buildings by Finnish Architects over the previous two years. 0607 Started last week in Helsinki and is shortly opening in Paris in their Architecture centre also, but I have assembled a guide to each building in the exhibition just in case you aren’t in Helsinki or Paris this summer, or are in Finland and actually want to visit a building or two. Its a kml which you can download in google earth or view in google maps (see the links at the bottom of this post). I have visited some of the buildings already and thought to write a few words about it before I go.

Firstly I think its a fair reflection of where Finnish Architecture is today and the only building I know about and that I’m surprised is not in is the Kotilo or Seashell house by house by Olavi Koponen. Private houses and public competition lead schemes provide most of the best work with Sandels Cultural Centre by Juha Leiviskä being one that stands out for me in particular, maybe because I have visited it.

Housing is again the week link in the exhibition, and shows up I would say are major weaknesses in the housing market in Finland. Apartment blocks here really are basically terribly boring. Both the construction method which is universally precast elemental block design and the conceptualisation of these designs is monotonous in the extreme non of the invention and risk taking evident in Danish housing at the moment are on show here. Even a cursory look at 0607 and then the previous buildings published in the previous two exhibitions in 0504 and 0302 would show you that in this area Finnish design is stagnant, staid and doesn’t serve the public well at all. A notable exception is the Triadi apartments by Huttunen–Lipasti–Pakkanen architects, was it a private commission? – I’ll see if I can find out .

Also why not a proper website for this exhibition and the previous ones? If you want to market Finnish Architecture design to the world you must include this method. It was actually done better previously see Finland Bygger website which covers Finnish Architetcure between the years 1992-97 before this current bi-annual format was launched. This format is, I think, an excellent way to provide a continuously updating overview of the Architecture scene here, the missing exhibition website is a big oversight however if you want to push Finnish Architecture internationally.

The kml I have made is a network link so when I update locations and descriptions after I see the exhibition in person, the file will also update automatically, in the meantime I hope you find it interesting. I will also at some point soon add the previous two exhibitions to the file. It is also worth noting that at the moment Google Earth has surprisingly bad imaging outside of Helsinki. Tampere and Turku Finland’s next biggest cities and with populations approaching 200,000 have no good satelite data at all, please google I hope you can change this soon.

FINNISH ARCHITECTURE 0607 is at the MFA between (4.6.2008 – 28.9.2008)

0607KML (GoogleEarth network link)(Googlemaps)

Frontiers of Architecture 1 – Cecil Balmond

Some weeks ago our office went to Copenhagen on an Architecture excursion and I’ve been sitting on a few posts about my time there because of lots of other things were taking priority, but I have a little time now so first post up is about a wonderful exhibition about the most influential man in modern architecture who you don’t know!

Frontiers of Architecture 1 – Cecil Balmond (flckr set)

Cecil Balmond model

Click through to read further. Continue reading →

Alvar Aalto through the eyes of Shigeru Ban


(photo by georg)

The Architect Shigeru Ban has developed an exhibition of some 14 Alvar Aalto projects which will be showing at the Barbican in London (22 Feb ’07 – 13 May ’07). I hope this exhibition can be brought to Finland too so I can see it. I’ll have to make do with the review by Johnathan Glancey which is excellent, and one paragraph stands out in particular;

As for the Finn himself, he was no saint. Fond of the bottle, something of a philanderer, and certainly no soldier, even at a time when Finland needed all hands to hold back Stalin’s hordes, he nevertheless helped give his country something of the character of responsible inventiveness that continues to drive its economy and society today. (JG)

It’s a bit shallow to see one person in terms of a personality of a whole nation but somehow very tempting in this case, its also illuminating that Aatos work is sufficiently deep that it can out as exemplarary of many different, and contemporary subjects that people choose to read into it. I would also say that Sigeru Ban may come to be seen as fitting into this quite exclusive category of Architects in the future.

Eero Saarinen

Ingalls Rink

A New Eero Saarinen Exhibition has launched in Helsinki (07.10-06.12) at the Kunsthalle here is the press release. That this is the first retrospective of the Architect is quite staggering given his body of work which, along with the Eames perhaps sums up U.S.A’s post war expansion best in the field of design. His list of clients runs like a who’s who in the Academic and Industrial world, and his Architectural style was flexible, and approach to engineering and materials pioneering. That he was sidelined so long in the Architectural establishment after his death, notably by Vincent Scully, is a grave omission that this exhibition should help to overcome. The exhibition following a couple of major books of him published last year follow the donation of the Saarinen office Archive to Yale University by Kevin Roche in 2002. It is these things which are re-establishing his reputation.

Jefferson National Expansion Memorial

The exhibition introduces photos, drawings, and models both from the donated archives and from some material from the Finnish Architecture Museum, also a documentary film has been made to go with it. From Helsinki it goes on a world tour ending in 2010 at Yale University Art Gallery. I went to see it last weekend and it really will help to renew interest in a post war American great. Oh and I didn’t even mention his furniture design such as the Tulip or Womb chairs. If you want to dig a little the Yale archive has a guide page to looking at the saarinen archive also check out the digital image database page the entire archive seems to be online but is typically quite hard to explore. I’ve geolocated a few of his buildings in Tagzania, which you can look at on the map or download the google earth network link for it. Also see my post Reconsidering Eero.