Education, Ideals, Education, Building, theIdeals, City An Installation in Four Acts Jaap Jaap Bakema Study Centre ak š Lada Hr / Bureau LADA Dirk van den Heuvel / exhibition design exhibition Patrick Coppens Patrick graphic graphic design curator

Het Nieuwe Instituut well well as context. its international as of structuralism aspects nary which looks into the interdiscipli- Total Space, is planned: project For 2016 tecture. a follow-up Dutch Structuralism in archi- of on event the centrates Installation in Four Acts con - An for today. potential its investigating while structuralism dimensions of 1960s historical the mining project of a research starting-point the It is on subject. the tation in Four Acts An Installation Structuralism: Landscape and Interior Landscape Ongoing research on on research Ongoing Structuralism Structuralism programme is the first presen- first the is project le l fi objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year

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Academy before moving their weekly evenings The Event City of to Hertzberger’s attic space. Exchange between teachers and students would be a recurring motif Dutch Structuralism in the Forum issues. The first one, largely com- Dirk van den Heuvel piled by Van Eyck and called ‘The Story of Another Idea’, was distributed at the last CIAM conference in Otterlo in 1959, organized by Jaap Bakema. It portrayed the history of CIAM and the beginnings Dutch Structuralism was born from a unique of Team 10 from the perspective of its Dutch confluence of people and events in the city of members, while it also made a strong plea for a Amsterdam in the second half of the 1950s. Aldo new (or ‘other’) approach to architecture and plan- van Eyck and Joop Hardy were teaching at the ning. Surprisingly, Van Eyck proposed Piet Blom’s Academy of Architecture, a meeting place for student work as the ultimate and didactic example Dutch modern architecture already before the of this ‘other idea’, which was summarized with the Second World War. After the war, the school had evocative image of a casbah organisée. moved to a new building at the Waterlooplein in the midst of the former Jewish quarter of the city, The Algerian Kasbah was but one of the many which would see dramatic changes in the next ideal cities that can be found in the pages of the decades due to large scale modernization pro- Forum journal of those years between 1959 and jects such as the new town hall and opera house, 1963, with a delayed issue published as late as the construction of the new underground and 1967. Dogon villages, Pueblos, Mediterranean the fierce street fights over the course of urban scenes of both urbane equipoise and lively socia- renewal policies. With a relatively open studio bility, amphitheatres such as the one in Arles, system, the Academy was quite more advanced Diocletian’s Palace in Split and Joseph Rykwert’s objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year compared to the Delft University of Technology ‘Idea of a Town’. Still, the ultimate city of Forum with its system of year professors who controlled was undoubtedly the city of Amsterdam itself, par- the curriculum. Piet Blom and Joop van Stigt ticularly so for the students it seems. For instance, were among the most outstanding students who both Blom and Van Stigt were born in Amsterdam. together with their teachers would fanatically The Dutch capital was then still dirty, worn down, pursue a new approach in architectural design, full of slums, but also brimming with everyday, albeit rather intuitively as well. At the same time, urban life. Van Eyck’s Municipal Orphanage was under The old working class neighborhoods of Jor- construction at the periphery. Joop van Stigt was daan and de Pijp were sources of inspiration in the Van Eyck’s supervisor and right hand during its search for another architecture that was to bring construction. His role was especially critical after about a new kind of social space beyond the clini- Van Eyck was denied access to the construction cal hygienic city of straightforward functionalism. site after some serious conflicts with the client and builder that involved among others the tearing Social Space down of bits of the building by Van Eyck during The notion of an inclusive, social space is nightly visits because they weren’t in accordance one of the more appealing aspects of the struc- with his ideas. turalist discourse in architecture. Especially Herman Hertzberger would consistently elaborate When the Forum journal got a new editorial board this notion. When talking about structuralism or in 1959 spearheaded by Jaap Bakema and Aldo social space Hertzberger resists any definition in van Eyck together with Joop Hardy, Jurriaan scientific or disciplinary terms, yet he tirelessly Schrofer, Gert Boon, and the young graduates describes the phenomenon by countless observa- Dick Apon and Herman Hertzberger, the new ideas tions of all sorts of instances how people behave found a platform that would dramatically enlarge and how they appropriate space. The ‘social’ of its impact. The editors would initially meet at the structuralism was tailored against sheer econom-

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ization of our cities and everyday lives. Also then First of all, there is the new awareness that archi- Within the history of Dutch Structuralism, or its aim to provoke the user to appropriate the unfin- in the 1950s, when Aldo van Eyck was building his tecture is embedded, that it forms a part of the wider context of the last CIAMs and the Team 10 ished spaces of structuralism. The user is not just Municipal Orphanage in Amsterdam and when he larger social structure that is society. That insight discourse on the future direction of modern archi- accommodated (as if such neutrality can exist in and the editors of the Forum journal laid out the comes from anthropology. This might sound like tecture, one finds many variants based on these architecture), but actually forced into a certain ‘story of another idea’, the social and so-called kicking in an open door to some, but it is not. Con- two trends: one approach that seeks to accom- mode of operating. humanizing of architecture and urban planning ventional wisdom thinks of architecture (and cities) modate the social and its events by providing a was part of a project to counter global moderni- as accommodating individuals and communities. structure, and another that conceives itself as an Within the urban renewal practices in Amsterdam, zation and the homogenizing of urban spaces. So, From this perspective the search for an archi- event part of a larger structure. The former is the one finds an even more socially and politically what could be said about the kind of social space tecture of social space gets too often reduced more conventional one and is commonly associ- charged approach that might be termed the as proposed by the Dutch structuralists? What sort to the idea of architecture as a frame for society ated with the formal elaborations of structuralism, second moment of Dutch Structuralism. In itself, of architecture and what sort of city comes to the and everyday life, a structure that accommodates in particular Van Eyck’s Orphanage, Piet Blom’s the story is by now quite a familiar one, albeit fore in their writings and projects? indeed. The most utopian (and megalomaniac) Kasbah in Hengelo, or Hertzberger’s Centraal rather stereotypical. During the 1960s, Amsterdam proposals derive from such fallacy: universal Beheer office building in Apeldoorn. The latter is became a hotbed of anti-authoritarian activism structures that are open for all sorts of events, the more irritant approach that was made opera- and experimentation with Provo being the most temporary infill and human appropriation, as in the tive in the political debates and street fights over radical exponent, clearing the way for the squat case of the most radical examples of Constant and the course of urban renewal in the historic inner movement of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Yona Friedman, but the same can be said of some cities, Amsterdam in particular. The inner-city and the historic districts were in of the projects of Piet Blom and Jaap Bakema. desperate need of modernization. The large- The formal characteristics of Dutch Structuralism scale schemes for new office development and The reverse is usually overlooked or forgotten, present a paradox, since the basic starting point is motorway construction as planned for by the city namely that human activities and social institu- the classic avant-garde notion that form is not an raised immense protests. The construction of the tions bring architecture into the world. To rethink a priori given, but a result. Yet, looking back one underground, which was accompanied by massive structuralism in architecture and its specific cannot help but recognize a structuralist formal demolition in the historic Nieuwmarkt neighbor- achievement, it would be a most productive language based on the multiplying of small units hood, triggered the start of street revolts against approach to also think of architecture itself as an into larger patterns or structures by way of all sorts the city government. The city and its planning event or piece of infill. It was Aldo van Eyck who of serialist compositional operations. One could bureaucracy were forced to drop the initial plans mastered such reciprocal thinking like nobody even state that today we still speak of structur- and adopt a new approach. Supported by the local Aldo van Eyck, Municipal Orphanage, Amsterdam (1955–1960) else. His proposition of a city as a large house and alism in architecture, exactly because of its very citizens, Aldo van Eyck together with students from a house as a small city is but the most famous and formal specificity: the idea of labyrinthine clarity the Amsterdam Academy of Architecture, espe- The very word ‘structuralism’ can be called an straightforward example. The sculpture pavilion in and the casbah organisée. It is also a naked kind cially his later office partner Theo Bosch, would afterthought or post-rationalism. While the term Sonsbeek (1966) is perhaps one of its most poetic of architecture, with untreated concrete, natural bring an entirely different approach to the recon- originates from anthropology and linguistics demonstrations, in which the notions of structure wood, bare bricks, that not only invite but actually struction of the neighborhood. As early as 1970, (Lévi-Strauss and De Saussure in particular), it and event are reversed, with the structure of the wasn’t until the 1970s when it became current in pavilion being derived from the events created architecture. Van Eyck would rather talk about the by the encounters between the sculptures who ‘configurative’ and Piet Blom spoke of ‘casbah-ism’ inhabit the pavilion and the temporary visitors of and ‘structure’. Hertzberger seemed to have pro- the public.

posed the term quite early on in the late 1960s, after which Arnulf Lüchinger popularized the term. The City of Events It might be argued that we are looking at a chain The city built up from a concatenation of of reinventions: with each new definition the idea events and encounters is a recurrent motif in of structuralism in architecture is renewed as structuralism. A building is no longer conceived of well. The validity of the term is still disputed today, as an autonomous, solitary object, but as a piece since any unambiguous definition seems hard to of fabric enmeshed in a web of interrelations: achieve. Still, there are a few reasons why the term between individuals, communities and their daily Structuralism might help to understand the shift routines, between use and territory, built fabric

in architectural thinking that was brought about and social fabric, or to put it in Ruth Benedict’s , playgroundZaanhof, Amsterdam (1948) from the 1950s onward, and which hasn’t been terms in ‘patterns of culture’. Alison Smithson absorbed completely until today. called it ‘mat-building’. Aldo van Eyck van Aldo

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piecemeal and mixed development together with a embedded, a piece of the accumulation of histori- In 1967, the city of Amsterdam organ- highly differentiated housing typology and restric- cal experience that makes up the European city, in ized an open competition to end the tion of car access was to set the new standard of this case the city of Amsterdam. debates on a new town hall, which had lasted for decades already. 803 urban development. entries were submitted from all over In a way, the numerous designs of playgrounds by the world. Among other things the The City of Architecture Van Eyck, which he started to realize from 1947 competition meant a breakthrough The new approach implied a city made out onward, already held the seeds of such a defini- for Dutch Structuralism since the new approach was recognized as of architecture and not so much an architecture tion. The events created by playing children and an alternative for the large-scale of the city, a proposition which was to become supported by the configurations of elementary play projects for the Amsterdam inner city internationally popular among architects and urban furniture were to regenerate the fabric of post-war that were planned at the time. planners mostly due to Aldo Rossi’s book of the Amsterdam, both the old, historic neighborhoods The projects of Herman Hertzberger same title and published in 1966. To comply with and the new districts on the outskirts of the city. and John Habraken show two very any hypothesized disciplinary autonomy and to Still, the project of playgrounds aimed for a new different tendencies how to deal with follow the inherent hierarchies of urbanism and harmony, such a project of reconciliation seems the urban context. Hertzberger pro- architecture was anathema to Van Eyck cum suis. gone in the practice of urban renewal. posed a building that is a metaphoric image of a small city with a grid of To start with architecture and the small scale small towers and inner streets and in was an intent provocation as to resist the mech- Ultimately, it was Piet Blom who delivered the the centre a handful of monumental anisms of planning and any top-down approach. endpoint of the city of events in his project for the volumes that house the ceremonial Architecture was to be not just an act of the Oude Haven in Rotterdam. He was called in by the and democratic functions. Its diagonal positioning sets it apart from the old imagination to go beyond functionalism, but in this city to redirect the development of the inner city fabric of the city. Habraken based his struggle for the city it also aimed to be an irritant into a more urban and differentiated environment design on the urban structure of the to prevent assimilation in the smooth politics of that had to substitute a planned motorway and city; the construction of the new town a post-industrial, global era. The projects built in bridge landing. Blom’s approach leads to a still hall, its measurements and zoning were derived from the way the urban the Nieuwmarkt neighborhood invariably testify of unsurpassable gesture one might claim (hence its blocks are divided up in smaller plots. objectnummer / this contrary mentality. It is an architecture that quality as an endpoint). He succeeded in combin- His design is organized around two inventarisnummer architect / author year streets and two squares following the provokingly reappropriated the old city, a series ing the populist with the experimental, pop art with H. Hertzberger 1967 of events and happenings that still highlight the the historicist. Since the site was almost a terrain basic morphology of the site. A basic structure of party walls is provided. In pattern of former gaps in the urban fabric caused vague, only the so-called White House office tower his view each city department could by the earlier demolitions. and a row of old houses had survived the German hire its own architect to build their bombardment of the Second World War, Blom offices within this open structure. If big institutional and corporate buildings would decided to create a collage of faux city fragments propose to ‘fuck context’ (in the famous words of by his own hand. The whole project consists of four Koolhaas), these small pieces of city events clearly separate projects all designed by Blom with the state to fuck autonomy of the architectural disci- one of the Cube Houses as the most prominent pline and the institutions that assign architecture and famous one. Together with the library by Van to this sort of space in the larger dispositif of the den Broek and Bakema on the north edge of the power structure. From this, it also becomes logic site, a vast collection of structuralist typologies is that any classical approach in composition is left realized here. A collage of interconnected bits and behind in this event-architecture: the cultivation of pieces of clusters, Kasbahs, streets-in-the-air and awkwardly unstylish facades and their materializa- terraced, horizontal landscapes, each fragment tion, the unorthodox use of colors, they all signal an example of the house-city analogy. Together, the unruly kind of urban lifestyles of the period, they create at least two big spaces for encoun- just as they are a demonstration of a democracy of ter, the dock of the Oude Haven with its bustle of popular dissent rather than the current neo-liberal cafés and restaurants and the eerily quiet raised consensus. With the projects for the Nieuwmarkt plaza under the cluster of Cube Houses that cross neighborhood, most of which are still considered the busy street Blaak. Especially the latter, a very controversial within the architectural profession, bright place because of the omnipresent yellow Dutch Structuralism seems to find its ultimate and the light coming down through the openings of urban definition. Structuralism itself becomes the roof of cubes still defies any categorization.

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objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year H. Hertzberger 1967 H. Hertzberger 1967

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Speak, Why am I writing this, why do precisely these anecdotes surface when I’m asked about the Memory! background of Het Nieuwe Instituut’s choice for long-term research into structuralism? For me, the Guus Beumer reason lies in the analogy: I was a student when doubt had already made itself felt, doubt about I was a student when doubt had already made welfare work, doubt about a social infrastructure, itself felt. In the mid-1970s I walked into the Social doubt about the eternal polarity between bot- Academy at Westblaak, Rotterdam – an 18-year tom-up and top-down, doubt about architecture old, embarking on my studies. You might say the and, by extension, urban renewal and community social academy was one, if not the ideological work as an instrument for social engineering and, center of the welfare state. Not only intended of course, doubt about the idea of an equitable to shape the critical contours of everything that society. Doubt as regards the social aspect that ‘social’ could achieve. It also provided the sup- Hans Achterhuis was to formulate brilliantly in ‘De port staff of social workers, community workers markt voor welzijn en geluk’ [The Wellbeing and and socio-cultural workers for an intricate infra- Prosperity Market] (1979). structure of temporary refuges/shelters, crisis-, And those doubts, that were so at odds with community- and youth centers, and the like. It the ideas of the post-war reconstruction genera- was the time when the social aspect was sup- tion like Van Eyck and Bakema, inevitably formed posed to function as the dynamic motor for a new the gateway to that other ideology, that of the society, aided by architecture and urban planning market, of the consumer. I also remember the as agents of change. The academy building, more moment of intellectual release when all those or less across the street from the architecture reader-unfriendly publications by companies like office of Van den Broek and Bakema in Posthoo- Suhrkamp, for instance about false consciousness objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year rnstraat, had the typical aesthetic of its day, with (1971, Wolfgang Fritz Haug, Kritik der Wahrenäs- H. Hertzberger 1967 endless gravel-screed floors, flanked in places thetik [Critique of Commodity Aesthetics]) made by pale grey walls of aerated concrete slabs. In way for a more perceptive description of the addition, the interior was characterized, apart superficial, which could cover every antithe- from a huge rope wall-hanging, by pragmatism. sis, and pop culture, fashion and punk were not Looking back, it was mainly the vast numbers of automatically disqualified as expressions of civil washing machines (where else could a student proto-fascism. Nowadays, we know that that mar- do the laundry?) and the white Formica tables ket and its endless flexibility did not provide the littered with plastic beakers that were typical promised answer either, and once more a pro- appointments. ductive moment is being sought and the domain From the very first day – and ultimately I of the ‘social’, including the ideology of top-down spent four years there – every standpoint, every versus bottom-up, and the possible role of design political truth, every personal ambition was are being reassessed. Just when the polarity analyzed, discussed and in the end rejected, so between market and government, between con- that everything seemed to be permanently in a sumer and citizen, appears to have been abolished state of flux, never to solidify. The first day all the and we refer to ‘a culture of convergence’ (Henry lecturers were on strike, often themselves only Jenkins), to a creative industry and the moment four, five years older than myself; they refused when the contract between the citizen as a con- to continue as ‘lesson-merchants’, demanding sumer and the government as the market, should that the student take the responsibility for his be revised. In other words, now is the moment own learning program. In my final weeks, the when the deployment and arsenal of Structuralism plenary meetings – the last vestige of an institu- are again experiencing social urgency – to use it tional structure – were dominated by paralyzing as a lens to take a fresh, yet investigative look at criticism of the individual character of the social the present situation, with the infinite wealth of the infrastructure, which from the inside out…. institute’s archive providing a helping hand.

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scrutinize post-war avant-garde, which On the face of it, the present-day Someone believing in something, is Someone who abhors power is not may or may not have existed, and link avant-garde, the existence of which I naïve and, since 1800 (after Roman- a pacifist (because it goes with the it up with the present day, thus avoid- acknowledge, a priori, differs primarily ticism) has no raison d’être – except idealism of the twenties and thirties), ing all too pronounced a historical from that of the pre-war period in a as a Sunday painter, but he has no but a yobbish individual. or museological attitude vis-à-vis the social sense. It does recruit support longer been of interest since Rous- Someone who creates a place interwar period. by way of stencilled leaflets, but other seau the customs officer either. wherever he may be, is an enviable In order to liven up the discussion, than that it is resigned and does not Someone who believes in nothing individual. But he who creates places there is also a small exhibition com- compete for society’s goodwill. is not a nihilist (since nihilism is a everywhere where people have to be, prising three partitions devoted Existentialist, and very aware happy feeling), but a cynic… resembles a terrorist more than an to the post-1945 avant-garde – with of beat and hip freeloading off an Someone who takes action is a architect. a view to highlighting a specific mood organism that they despise and deny, criminal (Goethe), although, accord- What does architecture look like or couleur locale. but thank heavens without feelings of ing to Sartre it isn’t bad if you dirty when designed from the perspective guilt. your hands…. of a sleeping bag. Avant-garde / Advance-guard: it They benefit from a situation to Someone who doesn’t take action implies something must follow: achieve a certain modality. is not a ‘wise man’, but an acces- When, in our total negation (of both a group, a crowd. sory…. the chair and the city) we go looking That group calls its predecessor the Art is a term for the ‘guard’, for the Someone who pursues something for allies – allies prior to 1945 – we ‘avant-garde’. Someone sees himself guardians, the tenacious, the con- is fixated and mentally doomed. discover Jarry and Dada to start with. as a precursor, pioneer, trailblazer of servers, the last of the Mohicans and, Someone who acts normally is a With Ubu, pataphysics is the an idea, an idealistic group. lastly, the OASers.* conformist, but he who acts abnor- splendid simultaneity of physical It sees itself as avant-gardist of It has been replaced, not by mally because it’s the done thing is a phynance [finance] and merde [shit]. a society, community, partnership. ‘imagery’ – still a romantic watchword conformist of nonconformity. And with Dada, it’s Marcel Duchamp’s The avant-garde plays its part for – but by alive ‘inter-est’, interior- Someone who acts normally foremost, humblest gesture – the beer the guard, the upholders, the citi- ity, reacting time and again to the because that isn’t ‘done’, is a noncon- mat. It was preceded by the spectac- zens, the mainstream admirers. For expressivity of reality, the world, the formist of conformism. ular bicycle wheel; the urinal and the the avant-gardist the fact of being occurrence. Anyone singling out Someone who displays power bottle rack followed. avant-gardist is a social role. expressivity alone (so noncommittally) (“power is inherently evil”, Burckhardt) It not only meant art must exist, loses out. When a small sect is ‘in’, it is a fascist. art is manifest, but also represented Think of Brecht, a photo of whom is operates on the fringe of a society, it pinned up here, and of the socio-an- is completely ‘out’, outside, exterior, architect / author archistic tenor of his early pieces and status, status symbol, welfare state, the man himself, who took hours in sunshine consumer, in word (and I the morning to fix his curiously-cut hope the contempt is clearly evident): The artist and cultural philosopher A V A N T - G A R D E hair onto his skull with water. And his tourist. A tourist, even in his own city Joop Hardy (1918–1983) exerted a major carefully selected cap – all of which and among the status symbols sur- influence on the shaping of ideas within Dutch Structuralism. He was an editor of Introduction by J. Hardy was intended to underline his position rounding him, even in his own home. the journal Forum, a tutor at the Academy Delivered on as precursor and trail-blazer. of Architecture in Amsterdam, and later a Saturday 8 February 1964 This touristy world is ruled by hard- professor at Delft University of Technology (next to being Director of the Art Academy Think of Dada and the role every boiled political gangsters, who control in Enschede, AKI). He published very little member had to play in the propa- the entire arena of manipulable reality. and lives on largely in the stories of con- Ladies and Gentlemen, ganda circus. In contrast with those ‘power-brokers’ temporaries. The archive of the Academy of Architecture contains an occasional lec- are the ‘softies’ – the marihuana, ture text such as the one published here. When the three items planned for the Think of the Futurists and Surrealists hash, and L.S.D. boys and girls, who ‘I 10’ exhibition: and all the other activist groups and maintain their shaky existence until Hardy’s teaching was associative, firing the imagination. He liked to refer to André Mal- small exhibition relating to the revolutionary circles who, with their they are perfidiously absorbed in the raux’s idea of a ‘musée imaginaire’, which twenties and thirties art, as well as their actions and behav- prosperity camp. he defined as the simultaneous presence 2 or more seminars iour, pressed for a sea-change of Man Slapdash Juliette Greco was one of of all traditions from all corners of the world and from all periods. He was famous excursion and society. the first to advance from her concrete for his extensive collection of slides, his were being prepared, the Dutch basement to the luxury hotel. Jean ‘imagetheque’, featuring images from the monthly Goed Wonen got Simon Think too of the anarchists, the big- Genêt’s story demonstrates that not decadent Viennese fin-de-siècle period to the natives of Mekong. Vinkenoog to conduct a survey on the gest of all social idealists. even prison can offer sufficient pro- concept ‘avant-garde’. tection. Colin Wilson became a literary Students were confronted in his classes Think of the Bauhaus with its ethic of insider with his book The Outsider. with a cross section from the world of an- thropology, psychoanalysis and art history, The survey revealed complete con- material and technology, and passion from Ruth Benedict’s Patterns of Culture fusion concerning that concept. So for instructing, guiding, educating. We might be cynical and say: it’s and Nikolaus Pevsner’s Pioneers of Modern it seemed like a good idea to focus always manipulation, one with Design to Johan Huizinga’s Homo Ludens. attention on the term avant-garde at All this evidences an optimistic social orgasms, another with power, and in the start of this talk, since an evalua- idealism that frequently appears the empty ‘in-between’, the intellectual tion of the twenties and thirties greatly in highly exhibitionist guise, com- manipulates ‘sacred reason’ as the depends on how the term is inter- plemented by the voyeurism of the only criterion for his freely-rambling preted. Also, it offers an opportunity to bourgeois and the art lover. criticism.

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the reality of the beer mat compared that minimum of personal intervention, submits, adapts, socializes. with the reality-deficient artwork, the we found the source of 0 = zero. That includes – pursuing the art compactness of cardboard compared theme – the open museum that with the emptiness of art. From there, the multitude of new admits every manifestation, attracts What Duchamp proclaimed was: movements began: every event and, in doing so, neutral- thanks to the willingness – the deci- architecture of air izes, invalidates it. sion, choice, gesture – all ready-made sculpture of fire art, i.e. ‘baptized objects’, that has lost moved movement (Tinguely) Through S. Giedion we are acquainted its innocence because of its selec- snare pictures (Spoerri) with architecture’s relation with tion, and can, therefore, enter into a fixation of reality, unveiling of inti- suprematists, constructivists, neoplas- person’s imaginary world. macy ticists, purists, geometric abstracts, or In 1960 that position was taken décollage architecture as a cubist artwork.

as the premise of neo-dadaists or The connection with Dada and (1967) , De Meerpaal, Dronten ‘t, Karregat, Eindhoven (1973) neo-Merz à la Rauschenberg, and the The solidity of New Realism – that surrealists has always been awkward. neo-realists in Paris. anti-symbolic, anti-romantic, anti-aes- The nausea, alienation and the thetic, anti-cubist, anti-baroque and whole process of appropriation,

In a reaction to the weariness, the anti-abstract, but pro-social or pro-so- of integration and identification of Van Klingeren Van Klingeren fatigue vis-à-vis lyrical abstraction, ciological reality – teaches us that the anti-roman, roman chose, Pro-Ro- abstract expressionism, tachisme, world of things produces a permanent mane, nouvelle vague, cinéma action painting and vitalism, sym- image and that, thanks to choice, can vérité, modern poetry to facilitate an

bols whose value could no longer be elevated to a work of art. existence among obscure, no longer -

- be defined, whose forms had lost interpretable things has passed archi- -

their enchantment and magic, that That interpretation of life as pure tecture by. (as showman-like material-aesthetic, expression, as a great happening, has industrial mannerism) had been drawn taken poetic adventure to a new level. If the poet is the bad conscience into the realm of affluence and chic It is no longer a noncommittal game, of his time (Saint-John Perse), the luxury – a kind of Domus mentality. but an existential matter. architect is, by definition, the optimis- Then there are the everyday tic conscience. The New Objectivity problems, the everyday conflict with “Making his own life an instrument of testified to that. a social reality that is becoming his liberation” (the link to Zen is clear) But in the end the architect increasingly independent and threat- and assuming the responsibility for the identified himself so much with the ening – propelled by an ever more existence of every object that I raise current state of society, its superficial

powerfully mechanized civilization – to up because of its expressivity. (Art is problems and superficial optimism, not mistaken, And if I’m units. he included a computer program to guidethe process of appro priation.The idea wasthat this well-coated steel structure would outlastthe first phase plug-ins and be adjustedtime. over And that’s exactly what happened. 2000 it had year the by However, become a corroded mess as result ofthe over-enthusiastic extension and densification by its users in combination with intensive use; destroyed by its own success. When Cedric fans protested against demolition, it was Price himself who saidthat demolition The struc option. the better was ture had outlived itstime. And so it was demolished, includingthe steel constructionthat was still in good shape; maybethey reused it elsewhere. Piet at 11:52 On 29 Sep. 2014, vanDirk den Heuvel wrote: Thanks Piet, this pro did show Hertzberger ject as an example of failure in his lecturesTU Delft. at But its failure is primarily onthe level of beautiful form, let’s or say ofthe As itself. language of architecture community center, it still seems to perform well and as process it new and firmer too; is successful additions were added, as Google view shows :-) street Best, Dirk destroy the individual and cause him showing, never explaining.) that architectural differences acquired - -

to abandon simple, individual and This is about a post-existentialist characteristics of superficial differ- - instructive needs. appropriation of the world of things. entiation, and most architects can be -

As an exponent of all those who are The victory over ‘nausea’, the defined as waste-makers. -

in danger of being overwhelmed, Nor- positive continuation of the ‘roman- man Mailer says: that sacrifice is too chose’ of the ‘force des choses’ to I hope to have given sufficient offence great for a civilization that has moved neo-constructivism that is in evidence to provoke a stimulating discussion. only a short distance from barbarism. everywhere. One that will have first to determine A conclusive step on the way to the its own position before judgement can As a reaction to the ambiguity of all conclusive conquest of the world as be made on the words of the twenties the marks, notches, tattoos, sen- the beginning and end of all meaning. and thirties. tences, letters, signs, craters, sores After all, this is not about abstrac- and burns, the wounding or vital A. The avant-garde between the two tions like space, interpenetration, supports) allowing clip-on exten actions, the products of accident and world wars was committed to society, immaterialization, simultaneity, et sions.The project presentation in , Herman Hertz Arnolf Lüchinger starts with four 1959–1986 berger drawings of four cartoonesque phases of appropriation. So so far good. Butthe next pages show center community ‘completed’ the (wasthe process of appropriation already finished during design? ;-). It’s not mentioned inthe text if participation ofthe inhabitants ofthe neighborhood was part of the process, butthe description suggeststhat the inhabitants themselves ordered prefab structures and addedthose to the basic structure. It is unclear if this is what really happened, but boththe author andthe architect (I presume) were disappointed withthe end result. "The result is disappointing comparedtheto spatialgreater possibilitiesthat an architect might have offered them."Appropriation wasn’t to be lefttheto user, evidently, and Hertzberger would keepthis in his own hands from now on.A pot plant on a parapet here and there is permissible, but adding an ugly prefab room is downright ‘disappointing’. Hadthinkto of Cedric Price’s in Lon Centre Inter-Action too, don one (1977) ofthe few projects he actually Thisbuilt. also consists of a struc IAC tural support (inthis case a well-conserved open-ended steel construction) which for users could produce their own additions. Cedric was somewhat provid than Herman by smarter ing a catalogue of available off the shelf containers and neglect, only those things remained for idealist regarding technology, pro- cetera, but about a reality that exists

-

which one held oneself responsible. gress, the salvation and liberation of outside all art, but of which, through - - - ‘Informal’ was also ambiguous. As mankind imbued with an ideal world art, we must first get a conception. - -

Henk Peeters wrote in the exhibition empty of ‘things’. After the existential catalogue for Herman de Vries at catharsis of emptiness, loneliness, J. Hardy Metz: “A considerable austerity set in boredom, disgust and the demise of and, with that purism of the informal, aesthetic categories and artistic blue- we crossed the threshold to a new prints comes period.” B. the post-1945 avant-garde, com- In my opinion, the greatest purism mitted to itself and, in addition, to the could already be found in Yves Klein’s world of ‘things’, matter and objects.

work, in the monochrome of his They are small, almost closed COMPETENCEAND PERFORMANCE IN STRUCTURALIST BUILDINGS mechanically applied industrial blue. communities juxtaposed to an ‘open * Organisation de l’Armée Secrète, active in a public setting. After the first salon on Dutch Structuralism, an e-mail corre spondence developed between curator Dirkvan den Heuvel, researcherVollaard, Piet and Volume editor Arjen Ooster man discussing the success of structuralism's theory and formal language on the one hand, and struc the actual performance of turalist buildings on the other. One theof guests,Vollaard Piet known pro mentioned a lesser ject Hermanof Hertzberger: the community centre De Schalm in Deventer, designed and in 1972 built as and between 1976, 1974 Structur failed of an example alism to highlight the limits of structuralism in architecture. On 26 Sep. at2014, 00:15 wrote: Vollaard Piet Gentlemen, project is interest The Deventer ingits for linear, open, minimal structure,that can be extended the(by inhabitants of course). A bit thelike multitude of the 1960s; a in megastructures constructive support (a linear skylight in betweentwo rows of In that ‘perceivable emptiness’, in society’ which absorbs everything that Algeria from 1961–1962 [editor’s note]. During the Structuralism exhibition, weekly 'salons' were held to discussvarious aspects in structuralism with experts of

An Installation in Four Acts An Installation in Four Acts 17 16 Education, Ideals, Building, the City Education, Ideals, Building, the City objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year

, Community Center , Community Center Plan of‘t Karregat showing open access and function two schools,mix: shops, and a community center Herman Hertzberger (1974) De Schalm, Deventer development Anticipated ------

On 1 Oct.On at2014, 1 22:26Arjen wrote: Oosterman Hello Piet, Fascinating examples and I endorse observationsyour on Highly over-es adaptability. teemed issue, think,I at least when it comes to plug-and-play adaptability. Most houses are for the container adaptable, as construction waste indicates,that arrives with every new occupant houseor owner. Kitchen and bathroom to arebe removed by default and most ofthe time there tooare many wallstoo. But I also witness an inclination to extendthe new property (row house, semi-detached single or family house). some reason, For people live in a housethat is too cramped. If an option,this adding a backpack is solved by conservatory). or (extra floor Anyway, it happens a lot and consid Hertzberger someone like eredthat an issueto incorporate in his designs. thinkI we should differentiate between housing and a community center, which possibili comes with different ties. It would be interesting to smaller is for trend the know if apartments, caused by energy considerations smaller sizedor families (notthe trend where I livethe by way; inyoutown my should have five kids to meet the norm).That’ll be a challenge architects,for ifthat’s what isto come. Not sure if structuralism is task. that help in facing a great Cheers, Arjen kind of spatial arrangements were possible (van Klingeren was rather involved intheatre renewal of histime). Along its borders, amenities like a craft room, small expo hall, and café (withterrace inside, not outside) were situated.KlingerenVan cov a as Meerpaal De of thought ered square. Perhaps it is urban the guise of architec design in ture. Design is allthe over place, the struc from but – different turalists there– was no attempt to create spatial complexity; on the KlingerenVan contrary, was focusing on (the possibilities for) programmatic complexity with a minimum of spatial means. That isthe big difference, think.I The ideathat a complex social structure is best served by a complex spatial scheme is one of the misconceptions of structur alism. On 02 Oct at2014, 13:54, van den Heuvel wrote: Dirk In some issues of Forum traditional Dutchvillages are referenced, but not many. Joopvan Stigt’s archive I saw a study of avillage polder that– is respected and just outside its borders a new analogeous – some is erected structure what like Candilis,Josic and Toulouse strategy Woods’ for design for le Mirail – Bakema’s Kennermerland is comparable as strategy – respectthe horizon for and some churchtowers and still without remorse. modernize ------

thing’ –thing’ a spatial configuration, a technical facility to –encourage and facilitate such appropriation. prevent is often ‘something’ That that. ing exactly ‘doorzonwoning’ the why That’s translation: sun cross [literal ing house; a crosswall dwelling type row house, of which more than a million were build inthe WW2 the post Netherlands in period, PV] is world champion appropriation options. It isthe absolute neutral house without any architectural characteristics varia (and still with remarkable tion, withinthe tight limits of its size and‘architecture’). But some larger size and spatial neutrality don’t haveto result in a building charac without architectonic teristics, Klingeren’sVan as De demon Meerpaal in Dronten strates. It is hardly morethan a steel-and-glass shed with a fringe ‘architec very of amenities. But and moretonic’ far appropriable than many a structuralist building, includingvan Klingeren’s own in Eind ‘t Karregat ‘structuralist’ hoven. I wouldn’t know of another buildingthat allowed so many different uses without physical adjustments. Though neutral, it did have a clever spatial concept with just enough (though sometimes irri tating) inducements different for uses.That’s why De Meerpaal is than better an ordinary shed of the same size.A neutral‘almost shedokay’ is not an option. Piet view. point of neer’s Piet, I would liketo know why De Meerpaal is not a neutral box, what specific inducements have been included in its design – also taking into accountthat a house is supposed to be as neutral as possible? Best, Dirk On 02 Oct at 2014, 12:07, wrote: Vollaard Piet is right, adaptability (flex Dirk ibility, whatever) is an issue of buildingtechnology and an who architects obsession for thatlike aspect in particular. Not structur something exclusively alist.Although, one could argue that structuralism picks up on a culture of change (the idea of progress).And that clashes sta for desire with people’s bility (specifically cultural), for tradition. Structuralism had little affinity withthe local building and architecturetradition. Why did Alsovan lookEyck atthe Dogon and not at socially and spatially traditionally organizedvillages in the Netherlands;there were still plenty ofthem inthe 1950s.Why travelthe world whenyou can goto nearby remote areas like the eastern part ofthe country? traditional be called a to Afraid ist? Piet The PS:most specific element ‘open air’ the of De Meerpaal is theatre of course. It was done in such a thatway quite different ------

On 30 Sep. at2014, 23:18 wrote: Arjen Oosterman Can I add Hertzberger’s BouwRAI housing inAlmere from 1990 thisto fascinating series? It anticipated extension without prescribed extension modules (by providing additional foundation That contrib correctly).if I recall utesto a more nuanced picture of Hertzberger and extension perhaps? Arjen Oct. On at2014, 1 13:18 wrote: Vollaard Piet Arjen, Hi Serious chancethat these or not extended houses were changed.And if so,then most likely differently from what HH provisioned.That at least isthe conclusionyou can draw from much further reaching adaptable housing in Lunetten (Utrecht) by SAR.The houses were fitted out with high-tech wallsthat could be with a simple removed or shifted clickThis system. way it should be easyto create another room a bigger or space. Occupants also received extra walls.Years later, hardly anything had been changed andthe extra walls were storage. their still standing idle in The demand adjustable for housing is often exaggerated. Appropriation is being done with paint, plants, furniture, and some posters onthe wall. I see as problemthat some architects ‘some provide to have they think On Oct. 2 at2014, 07:09 van den Heuvel wrote: Dirk Let me chip in. ‘groeiwoningen’ Bakema’s dwellings) in Eind (extendable hoven are another nice example – Like Bijlsma, Madeleine Maaskant, and Eireen Schreurs wrote an article Oase for about that – and if I’m not mistaken, everything was so well designed, that nothing had changed.Also a ofmatter generous sizing,they discovered. Structuralism is aboutthe language of architecture. Such a language is connectedto all kinds of social issues – flexibility not beingthe most determining onestructuralism for – but atthe it is about archi the day end of tecture itself.What new language deal effec to can we invent tively with what in philosophical terms is called uninhabitable our world? It is a cultural issue, not a technical one – as youas far can two of course. these separate Appropriation and inducements use for are much more central to Structuralism – and when it comesthese to areas,there is probably more frictionto be found between ambition and resultthan with regardto flexibil ity. Inthe Eyck,Van work of first is an art Eyck Van and foremost. ist; Hertzberger repeatstime and again didn’tEyck Van that want anythingto change whenthe Berlage Institute was about to Amster his Orphanage in occupy this work That doesn’t make dam. uninteresting, but coming from a complete different ambition engi an from like would one than

An Installation in Four Acts An Installation in Four Acts 19 18 Education, Ideals, Building, the City Education, Ideals, Building, the City objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year Van den Broek en Bakema 1980

By the end of the 1970s the Rot- terdam inner city was still visibly scarred because of the German bombardment during the Second World War. In the east part around the Blaak and Old Harbor area major projects were undertaken to enliven

the inner city with a mix of pub- lic buildings, leisure facilities and housing.

The office of Van den Broek and Bakema was in charge of the new public library. It was one of the big- gest new public projects at the time. With a flexible plan and a waterfall

Community center De Schalm. Community center Actual development of escalators it is conceived as a department store – a translation of the idea that culture and knowledge are fully democratized and accessi-

- ble to everyone. The building has an - - - - understated kind of appearance, only some of the technical facilities are highlighted with bright yellow colors.

Piet Blom on the other hand opted for a collage of various city fragments, with the megastructure of Cube Houses that crosses the busy road of the Blaak as its main attraction. His objectnummer / project is both anecdotal, metaphoric inventarisnummer architect / author year and ‘structural’. It creates its own P. Blom 1978 intuitively guessedthey existed. The field may havethere, butthe and univer not clear rules were sal. Van Eyck mayEyck Van havesal. created the chess a strong position on board, but he wasn’t interested howto reach checkmate in seven moves. Compare someone like Guy Debord, who designed a beau tiful chess-like sethimself for with such complicated rulesthat only he knew how to play the game. Marcel Or Duchamp who adjustedthe rules ofthe game at will once in awhile, if I’m not mistaken. Designerstendto forget that to comes with devel freely play oping rules (and adjusting them) while playing. Debord and Duchamp did so playing on their own, andthat is permitted, but as architectyouthe offer gameto others (andyou’re not present when people are actually playing). pro Hertzberger In Deventer, vided a field and some rules, but he was disappointedthe by gamethat developed – a failure. Perhaps Eyck,Van likehe should have created a strong position onthe chessboard himself ;-). what he did in his later That’s Thework. risk being that the game is directedto rigidly, a predefined play, in whichthe freedom to change the rules is lost. I’m exaggerating, of course. am I? Or Piet events with a narrative architecture such as the so-called ‘pencil building’. - - - In the view of Blom this was meant to -

- cheer up the dreary post-war recon- struction planning of Rotterdam and its working-class people. In last week’s salon, Hansvan chess as another to referred Dijk in metaphor, in reaction to Hertzberger’s often used game and field comparison; architec ture createsthe playing field,the users playthe game, andthat playing is called appropriation. words: Hertz van Dijk’s In Hans berger provides a chessboard van Eyck and rule set where creates a magnificent position onthe chessboard (checkmate in seven moves).As often, the metaphor produces some unexpected insight (particularly Eyck),Van on but atthe same time it produces all kinds of questions.The first being: dothe players/users knowthe rules of the game? In other words: do universal social rules/structures really exist, as (non-architec tonic) structuralism claims? Rules that don’t have to be taught. If so, I would loveto know, and I would also have liked to be harshly examined onthese rules during my architecture studies, includingthe next exam on how totranslate these structures spa Hertzberger I don’t recall tially. giving such an examination (I was a studentTU Delft at when Hertzberger wasteaching there). of In fact,used photo his often two people seated at tablea inthe tiny space betweentwo parked cars really showsthat any playing field, eventhe most one, can encourage play. unlikely the structur that hunch It is my alists (the architectsthis time) these universal rules/ didn’t know structures either,that they only - - -

Piet Blom was totally wild of his wild of his totally Piet Blom was own neighborhoodJordaan De in Amsterdam of course; perhaps he wasthe first to use local working-class neighborhoods as inspiration? D. On 02 Oct at2014, 22:03, wrote: Arjen Oosterman Hi Dirk, The language/use distinction is fascinating. Correct me if I’m wrong, but structuralism as language (let’s assumethat counter to exists) was developed a situation which for the existing Lan language was inadequate. guage as consequence, not as goal. Such a languagetakes on a life of its own, introduces its own dynamics.And nextyou have rhetoric. I agree with Pietthat structuralism is morethe image over of flexibility and freedom the actual achieve than time, ment ofthat ideal andthat a building like De Meerpaal seems the more effective answer. Arjen On 03 Oct at2014, 00:07, wrote: Vollaard Piet Arjen, conciseyour thanks for summary“that structuralism is morethe image of flexibility and freedomtime, over than the actual achievement ofthat ideal De Meer that a building like and paal seemsthe more effective Doneanswer.” withthat part of discussion? our

An Installation in Four Acts An Installation in Four Acts 21 20 Education, Ideals, Building, the City Education, Ideals, Building, the City objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year Van den Broek en Bakema 1980 Van den Broek en Bakema 1980

objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year P. Blom 1978 P. Blom 1978

An Installation in Four Acts An Installation in Four Acts 22 Education, Ideals, Building, the City Education, Ideals, Building, the City 23 objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year Van den Broek en Bakema 1980

capacity of lecturer at the academy, had set up Piet Blom: a ‘study of configuration’ – a project in which the from Kasbahism configurative approach was elaborated into a step-by-step method. to ‘structure’ Blom, who was appointed as a lecturer a year later, had also directed a configurative pro- Francis Strauven ject, of course in his own way and with his own emphases, which he expounded in his address. Remarkably, he made no mention of Van Eyck The address, found in the Blom archive, that was or the configurative principle. It looks as if he delivered at the opening of the ‘Structuur’ exhi- wanted to distance himself from Van Eyck and the bition on 18 September 1965 at the Academy whole story of configuration, which Team 10 had of Architecture in Amsterdam, is one of the few rejected, and that he, as the acknowledged initia- texts produced by Blom dating from that time. tor of Kasbahism, wished to continue developing Although, on first reading, it seems rather erratic, that movement in his own way. somewhat rash, when carefully re-read the text He advanced the term structure as a ‘canopy’ proves to reveal much about Blom’s position at covering the exhibited plans. He did not go into the time, and about the infancy of the movement the geometrical or thematic composition of that that become known successively as ‘kasbahism’, structure, but focused mainly on its mediating ‘configurative discipline’ and ‘structuralism’. role between social regulation and the aspira- In his address, held when he was a 30-year tions of contemporary society. The ‘ordering and lecturer and had been project-leader for a year, regulating character of the present day’ forms Blom, for all his insouciance, made a self-assured the base of the building brief and requires an impression. As an undergraduate at the Academy, ordered structure of the built environment. But it objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year he had emerged as a gifted, brilliant designer. In is the architect’s job to interpret that structure in P. Blom 1978 September 1959, Aldo van Eyck had presented such a way that it provides maximum freedom for Blom’s study project The Cities will be Inhabited developing life. Just as regulated working hours like Villages in Forum review as the outcome generate leisure time, the ordered structure must of ‘the story of another idea’. And at the CIAM open up space for the great diversity of unor- congress in Otterlo, that project also featured dered life. The structure he envisaged was to be alongside the plan of the Amsterdam orphanage, the opposite of a sequence of self-contained linked to it by the slogan vers une “casbah” organ- buildings that kept activities separate. He wanted isée. Blom had continued working in the same an open structure enabling various happenings vein, and had christened his design approach to be experienced at the same time. In his opin- ‘kasbahism’. In 1962 Van Eyck, who recognized ion, society was in a state of mutation. Life was Blom’s study designs as a continuation of his own enriched with a vast quantity of industrially-pro- thinking, had developed a theory to explain and duced things: machines, appliances, gadgets and substantiate the new design method in the steps other stuff. They form a kind of second nature towards a configurative discipline, a pivotal article and turn the human being into a new kind of in which he did not fail to expose Blom’s achieve- animal. The human being is no longer a person ments. with a fixed identity. “The centre of our individu- Admittedly, this propitious development was ality is at least situated outside ourselves.” Man brazenly frustrated by the Smithsons, who, at the becomes a decentred animal living in the plural. Team 10 meeting in Royaumont, had labelled Looking back over his development, Blom Blom’s Noah’s Ark a form of fascism. Their odious felt that Kasbahism had been a productive design condemnation caused Van Eyck to have misgiv- method, but it no longer corresponded to the new ings and temporarily spurn configurative design. 1965 attitude towards life. He felt the explicitness However, his students continued the develop- of the structure particular to the term ‘kasbah’ ment. In 1962–63 Herman Hertzberger, in his was especially outdated. He switched his focus

An Installation in Four Acts An Installation in Four Acts 24 Education, Ideals, Building, the City Education, Ideals, Building, the City 25 objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year P. Blom 1965

to the infinitely complex and elastic society that Piet Blom (1934–1999) was Aldo van Eyck’s Opening address tactics to understand the essence most famous and talented student at the at the exhibition of all that – if you raise it to the third would want only smother structures. “A more vul- Amsterdam Academy of Architecture. He gar realism has gradually developed.” Blom gave was a son of a greengrocer in the working power, it far exceeds the cubic meter class neighbourhood of de Jordaan. S T R U C T U U R volume of all the buildings together his address at the height of the Provo [Dutch Already as a student he gained a cult- – so we can apply some supports – status when his work was published in counterculture] era, and he was concretizing Forum as an illustration to Van Eyck’s plea given at the Academy of hard surfaces – to that choking crust the structure he envisaged in “living as an urban for another kind of modern architecture Architecture of everyday objects. As a bonus we which he captured with his slogan ‘vers also subject it to some nice spatial roof”, a project that with its rhythmical config- une “casbah” organisée’. on 18 September 1965 and formal rules. uration of pitched roofs produced a ‘realistic’ The lecture printed here, was delivered at by the architect P. Blom reassessment of the Dutch urban vernacular. the occasion of a forgotten exhibition at Among this nature-crushing quantity the Amsterdam Academy called ‘Structure’ It is worth noting that nowhere in his talk did in 1965. There are no images, nor do we of articles, from aspirins to under- Blom use the word ‘structuralism’. And, contrary know what kind of projects were shown. A guy walks to his scooter, carrying a ground rocket installations, we remain, Probably the work of Blom himself was helmet – before entrusting himself to having become, pre-eminently, the to what I wrote earlier, Blom was not the one who on display, just as the work of his fellow student Joop van Stigt. Both were the two the scooter, he corrects the shock-re- most sublime animal. We collect a cat introduced the term. It was brought up in 1966 finalists to the Prix de Rome competition sistance of his head by putting on the and a begonia that acquire a safe spot of 1962. In 1966 the exhibition travelled helmet – he won’t smash his head among the box files on which we have by Hertzberger when he presented his competi- to Hamburg where Jaap Bakema was tion entry for the Valkenswaard town hall: he told teaching; that edition contained the work while he’s on foot – right, now he’s also pinned a birthday calendar. of Blom, Carel Weeber and Jos Weber. more fittingly shock-resistant, like his the press that this could be seen as an example scooter – he – she – it drives – his Though we have not specifically of ‘structuralism’. Although a year later he still nervous system is connected in – at – agreed on it, it transpires that we do published students’ work from 1963 as a study and up, with the petrol engine – when not take an interest in airplanes, drill- of configuration, he apparently felt the need to it overtakes a girl and it slows down, it ing platforms, deep-sea capsules or becomes a machine showing an inter- radar screens. Admittedly, a launcher distance himself from the term ‘configurative’. At est in procreation – so – in context for a space satellite is the ultimate the beginning of 1969, the term ‘structuralism’ – the scooter is a new animal. tower, but we thought we should (relating to the movement I have been discuss- confine ourselves to doors, windows, ing) was launched in Dutch architectural circles There they are – hastily gathered escalators, sliding partitions, sliding together – some of our design roofs, turnstiles and mobile pave- by TABK-editor, Arnaud Beerends, who had heard projects, and a word. While we seek ments. Hertzberger use that qualification at the 1966 strength in one another’s presence, press conference. He went on to apply it to we lose our faith in that work and in We invoke, theoretically and aca- Hertzberger’s competition entry for the Amster- that word – that simply means struc- demically, the history of architecture ture. If it’s quiet enough to get in touch and are faced with the challenge of dam town hall. Five years later, it was adopted by with the almost impenetrable feeling constructing the Hagia Sophia from Arnulf Lüchinger, who introduced it internationally of what we meant – we get a shock as telephone cables, radiant heat, goods in Bauen und Wohnen. we walk past our design work – those lifts, petrol stations, supermarkets, Since the repetitive building structures to pertinent structures – adding that they domestic appliances, jukeboxes, aren’t structures – those predictions traffic lights and speedboats for a few which the term ‘structuralism’ is applied have little of brick, concrete, iron things with awesome jazz concerts. Meanwhile, in common with what, since the 1950s, has been which you must invent faith healings, we must get used to the fact that our generally understood in the social sciences as oil refineries, marriage proposals, orders can now be spoken, written – structuralism, that change of name remains an traffic accidents, Greek dances, auto- reproducible – simultaneously in 30 pilots, anti-smoking magicians, fish languages, dispatched or expressed in unfortunate choice. auctions, heart surgery, slum clear- punch card words. ance, tomato farms, astronauts and sewage treatment plants. If this sensual, amorphous, rampant enumeration of conditions is ludi- Or else, when categorically determin- crous, the word ‘structure’ is equally ing the smallest necessary, absolute ludicrous with respect to our plans. structure cell, so small and complete, we anxiously banish the nightmare The word ‘structure’ – as a canopy of the stapler, toothbrush, little negro covering our plans – wants to be a figurine, plastic toy elephant, photo siren, warning of a hole, the emptiness album, pills, oil tank, gladioli, season between unseen reality and imagi- ticket for the zoo, tropical fish, insur- nation. We feel it’s an urgent need ance policies, souvenirs, record player, to discover the nature, reason and shoe-clothes-carrot-pencil-scraper. sentiment of a(n otherwise absurd) reality. Because, if that reality escapes Yes, we design-makers have a go at us, the reward – the celebration of everything and grimly stick to thinking that reality – escapes us. It’s just as if

An Installation in Four Acts An Installation in Four Acts 27 26 Education, Ideals, Building, the City Education, Ideals, Building, the City objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year P. Blom 1965

architecture has to be set free from its hour. Compared with that profile the aristocracy, time and again, and then, actual situation will be infinitely more In their youthful vulnerability, terms time again, from a different aristoc- complex. Without that working hour used in this exhibition like ‘linear meter racy. or working day, it is not even possible of city’ or ‘automatic design process’ to compose such an average program or ‘general extensiveness’ deserve our What I call ‘aristocracy’ is the design profile. Changes occur several times a protection. I hope these opening argu-

habit of pressing buildings with addi- day and are incredibly numerous. ments have made them as meaningful - tional-infill-and sub-structures, with for you as they are for us. expressive frills and furbelows, and When faced with the limitless elastic- puffed up congress halls and inte- ity in which we use existing forms of I believe that the birth of an arche- gration plans included, into their skin ordering, our imagination as builders typal assignment is hidden in the to form the overall fabrication, and of ordering is sorely tested. framework structure. I contend, with conceived to include every possible respect to that anticipated seminal external effect. Aristocracy in the There is a pressing need to examine brief, that as yet we have limited sense of power, armed by spatial the recurring building briefs to find ourselves to components that cannot preference, tackling everything with laws governing program structure be extracted from it with impunity. The sacred spatial laws, with which what that enable them to serve as struc- lack of context has meant that pres- is legitimate is determined by the aes- tural material in the field of what ent-day structures have been deprived

thetic and preference for emptiness. is completely unspecifiable. That of signs of life. mini-megastructure, a landscape the same and environment at time. It holds referencestheto spaces Eyck’sVan Orphanage of (the conversation pit), andthe roofscapes of Piet Blom.And it is, in thea way, materialization ofthe acts four translating by them in different spatial relations on dis material visitor, between play and installation – inside, on top,next or to, and looking down on, at, or intothe or installation. this as a One could even see referenceto Bakema’s idea of waysto therelate to world: living below, between and abovethe trees. Aristocracy when everything can be unspecifiability is what forms the soul - read, measured, counted. Aristocracy of our living structure and, as yet, is Eight years ago, in this very same when everything, from drying laundry abruptly excluded by the specifiability hall, I gave a talk accompanying the - - to cars, has to be kept out of sight for of the buildings. exhibition of my first Kasbah plan. - the sake of that sacred emptiness. I automatically compare the word The word ‘structure’ warns against Just as regulated, well-organized Kasbah and the people and discus- that stubborn building carry-on, where working hours generate leisure time, sions that I associate with it with this every design process still ends at the the regulable, ‘nameable’ build- exhibition and the word structure. safe, rectifiable exterior. ing volume should generate the Kasbah-ism generated a produc- non-regulable volume as a reward, tive design method, which has been As long as buildings are being made, as a celebration, as leeway. Practi- detached from what, at the time, was a church is a church and a house is cal boundaries will have to be found the Kasbah feeling for us. I’m not sorry a house, a station a station, a library within the limitless that is inherent in about that split between method and

a library, and as long as you build the term ‘structure’. A boundary factor feeling, because I believe a more development of new geometric the dem to as a parallel systems the 1960s and ocratic spaces of 1970s, while ActThree ‘Building’ looks intothe way structuralist architecture became a dominant trend inthe larger projectthe for Dutch welfareThe state. final act ‘The City’ looks atthe second moment of Dutch Structuralism revolving aroundthe heated debates onthe renewal ofthe Amsterdam inner city andthe modernization ofthe historic districts. Visitsthe to exhibition are sometimes become theatricized, performances inthe cases of the opening and public debates inthethis evening. endTo the installation is conceived as both a podium and large furni ture Thepiece.‘spaces’ ofthe installation also aimto evoke the and learn spaces of research ing by including among others heavy chests with drawers filled with extra materials fromthe archive, a small library devoted theto teachings ofthe forgotten Joop Hardy, a digital repository of images ofthe vast collections and a semi the Institute, of space nar weekly for public conversations and improvised meetings.The design ofthe installation by Bureau LADA eventually evokesthe spaces of Dutch Structuralism and its larger international context,the debates onthe future of modern architecture which took place betweenthe members Team of theJapanese10, Metabolists and such crucial individuals as LouisThe Kahn. installation is a what is stated, and what was forgot- of that type might be called a struc- mundane realism has gradually devel- ten ends up in the gutter. That’s why ture component, and its programmatic oped between the two, meaning that - - -

inside and outside now resemble hell boundary might be established from the distinctiveness of the structure - and heaven. The immense number of the requirement that it be used to as intimated by the term Kasbah has things we live with have declared war construct a general volume – simply been superseded. But the distinctive- against sacred space, and they will on the basis of economy (material ness of our feeling about our living win – then space will, at last, become economy). structure will be necessary if more mundane, then living in structure will realistic methods are to be found for no longer be inhibited by inside and Architecture can contribute to the structuring things. outside, by being in- or outside things. deep desire to experience occur- Nature will be restored for the human rences fully (uncategorized) thanks to This exhibition must be opened to animal. Compared with the way a its facility to ‘regulate’. The ordering enable it, in the coming months, to building is a person and personality, and regulating character of the pres- become a sanctuary for our creed, a

we human beings have long ceased to ent day is, on the one hand, the base reference for our capacity for appreci- ing out overlooked qualities of the historical production. One the spe instance of thinks for cific research intothe relation between architecture, space architec the way or and user, ture is conceived as a piece of a larger, urban fabric, including the orchestration of encoun ters of‘the other’. Onthe other hand,the historical material gains in critical potential in face oftoday’s obsessions, exactly because it is becoming history. the installation is con Hence, ceptualized as a supportthat gathersthe archival materials into new combinations. Making good use ofthe rich collection together of Het Nieuwe Instituut with additions from private archives such asthe one of the exhibition of van Eyck, Aldo materials shiftsvarious times the exhibition period. Four during the basic framework acts form to reconfigurethe materials: Education, Ideals, Building,The City.Act One‘Education’ focuses onthe moment when Dutch Structuralism was born soto speak,the confluence of with the new editorial policies ofthe Forum journal and its slogan‘The Story ofAnother Idea’, andthe construction ofthe Amsterdam OrphanageAldo by van Eyck, but most of allthe interactions betweenteachers and students atthe Amsterdam Academy ofArchitecture, including Van Eyck, Hertzberger, Apon,Dick PietTheo Blom, Bosch, Paul de Tupker van Stigt, Hans Joop Ley, Verhoeven.Two andJanAct ‘Ideals’ speaks ofthe obsessive be persons. The centre of our indi- from which our building brief arises. ation, a challenge to be elaborated on, - - - - viduality is at least situated outside On the other hand, the reason to reg- with words or events, by every individ- - - - - ourselves and will be constantly ulate in such a way what is regulated ual in this country who experiences its

changing. becomes the unseen – invulnera- attraction. ble – body of regulations. We build The discovery that we live in the plural the temple like that, as an ongoing We consider such elaboration as enables us to discover that we live in process, ongoing and indecipherable. assistance to get through the spasm structure as complex particles. It has become a harmful habit to pri- of value-change. Write your creed on oritize building briefs into briefs with the walls of our building. If we were to create a profile of our maximum motives for repetition. It is current living structure it would prove practiced by people who are so close A bottle of aspirin and a bunch of just about possible, with the aid of to the architect that it must be our gladioli will not harm this exhibition – specialists, based on data applying responsibility to change it. It is, after as far as I’m concerned, it’s opened

to a working day and in a working all, the worst enemy of structure! – an o p e n i n g –. An Installation inActs: Four Education, Ideals, Building, the City Curatorial Statement vanDirk den Heuvel and LADA/Lada Hr š ak Bureau ‘Structural project The research Acts’ An Installation in Four ism: was developed as a performative the presenta After exhibition. tion inthe Dutch pavilion at Venice Biennalethe it2014, is the first public presentation in the Netherlands ofthe work of the recently establishedJaap a collab Study Centre, Bakema oration between Delft University Technology ofand Het Nieuwe The instal Instituut in Rotterdam. lation is one half of a double exhibition devotedtheto subject The other Structuralism. of Dutch half is designed and curated by Herman Hertzberger, one of the foremost representatives of Dutch Structuralism.Whereas Hertzberger’s presentation might be labeled as living history, an insider’s story,the Installation in an outsid Acts entertains Four er’s perspective, one of research, critique and reflection. An Installation Actsin Four does not aimto produce a new canon of Dutch Structuralism. Onthe contrary, it seeksto develop new that might be produc questions tive in light of current issues. On the one hand, urgencies and fas cinations (not to say neuroses) of contemporary architecture and planning might shed a new past bring the recent light on

An Installation in Four Acts An Installation in Four Acts 28 Education, Ideals, Building, the City Education, Ideals, Building, the City 29 objectnummer / objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year inventarisnummer architect / author year

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Structuralism:An for Volume 42, is a for pp. 18-20; pp. 29-31; archive p. 7; Instituut, Rotterdam 18, 14, 17, 15, pp. 9-12, 21-24, 26; Lada Hr š ak / Bureau LADA p. 31; Madeleine Steigenga p. 32 Scagliola/Brakkee Design Coppens Patrick Belgium Die Keure, by Printed This publication, a supple ment collaboration between Het Nieuwe Instituut,TU Delft andtheJaap Bakema Study Centre. It accompaniesthe exhibition Acts Installationin Four Contributors Guus Beumer, Piet Blom, John van den Heuvel, Dirk Habraken,Joop Hardy, Herman Hertzberger, Lada Hr š ak / Bureau LADA,Arjen Oosterman, Francis Strauven, denVan Broek en Bakema, VollaardPiet Editors vanDirk den Heuvel with Volume / Arjen Oosterman Translations WendyVan Os-Thompson Editor Copy Adam Nowek Illustration credits pp. 2-4; Johannes Schwartz archive p. 6; van Eyck Aldo van Eyck Aldo Wim Brusse, Collection Het Nieuwe Herman Hertzberger

An Installation in Four Acts An Installation in Four Acts 31 30 Education, Ideals, Building, the City Education, Ideals, Building, the City objectnummer / inventarisnummer architect / author year

, The Market, Hall, Rotterdam (2014) MVRDV Inthe background Bakema’s Municipal Library housing block ‘Pencil’ and Blom’s

An Installation in Four Acts Education, Ideals, Building, the City