TIRANA. ARCHITECTURE AS POLITICAL ACTOR POLITICAL I. Hotel Dajti 1 TIRANA. ARCHITECTURE AS POLITICAL ACTOR TOBIAS ADAM & ULRIKE KUCH (EDS.) TABLE OF CONTENT Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Bibliothek: Gefördert aus Mitteln des Open-Access-Publikations- Die Deutsche Bibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in fonds‘ der Bauhaus-Universität Weimar und vom der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte biblio- Thüringer Ministerium für Wirtschaft, Wissenschaft grafische Daten sind im Internet über http://dnb.ddb.de und Digitale Gesellschaft (TMWWDG). abrufbar. Diese Publikation ist im Rahmen eines Seminars an der Herausgabe: Tobias Adam und Ulrike Kuch Bauhaus-Universität Weimar entstanden. Der gesamte Texte und Fotografien: die Autor*innen Prozess und wurde durch folgende Partner*innen und Gestaltung und Satz: Copa-Ipa, Weimar Förderprogramme gefördert: Ein Kooperationsprojekt der Professur Theorie und Geschichte der modernen Architektur und der Experimentellen Fotowerkstatt der Fakultät Architektur und Urbanistik der Bauhaus-Universität Weimar. Das Werk einschließlich aller seiner Teile ist urheber- rechtlich geschützt. Das Werk steht unter der Creative- Commons-Lizenz Namensnennung-Weitergabe unter ..................................................................................................... gleichen Bedingungen (Share Alike) 4.0 International A Introduction 05 (CC BY-SA 4.0,https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by-sa/4.0/legalcode.de). th Bauhaus-Universität Weimar B A Short Introduction to Tirana's Urban Planning in the 20 century ......... 11 Die Online-Ausgabe dieses Werkes ist eine Open- Professur Theorie und Geschichte Access-Publikation und auf der Website der Bauhaus- der modernen Architektur ........................................................................................................ Universität Weimar (https://e-pub.uni-weimar.de/ I. Hotel Dajti 14 opus4/home) frei verfügbar. II. Skanderbeg Square ........................................................................................ 23 ................................................................................................ Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek hat die Online-Ausgabe III. Puppet Theatre 33 archiviert. Diese ist dauerhaft auf dem Archivserver VI. The Pyramid ..................................................................................................... 41 der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek (https://portal.dnb.de/) ................................................................................... hinterlegt: V. Polytechnic University 52 https://doi.org/10.25643/bauhaus-universitaet.3995 VI. Studio House Kadare ...................................................................................... 63 Eine Druckversion des Buches ist in limitierter Auflage erscheinen. Wenden Sie sich bei Interesse an C Thoughts on Architecture and ANT. The Kadaré Example ....................... 72 [email protected] Weimar, Oktober 2019 D Bibliography ..................................................................................................... 79 4 INTRODUCTION 5 ULRIKE KUCH Tirana is a city of contradictions. I think this definition Introduction largely mirrors our society and the inherent antagonism of our time. This is an important moment in our history: We are trying to get rid of the past and are working hard to catch up with the future, but we are still remaining in the middle of both. […] Tirana is a city that started to be what it is when a surrealistic boulevard was built in the middle of this Ottoman village. It may have been the only boulevard in history without a city. The city grew as an extension of the ambition that gave birth to this boule- vard and was of course influenced by the politics of the different eras. Looking at Tirana’s centre is like looking at a collection or a historical diary of political affairs and political love stories. [!Edi Rama, 2010!1!] What is the use of a theory of architecture? It is to think of architecture from another point of view, to learn to see, to understand, to think of space, situations and relationships. It is to develop a curiosity for the built environment that doesn’t stop with merely thinking about design, but also A reflecting on philosophy, sociology, media, or whatever ar- A chitecture might interact with. The aim of the seminar “TIRANA. Architecture as Political mar, students attended both an input and a workshop by 6 Actor” which laid the foundation for this book was to explore Tobias Adam on the idea of working with photography and 7 and discover a relatively little-known city in a relatively lit- architecture. Photography in this case should not regarded tle-known country. We, both students and instructors, were merely as a documentary record but should also be used as asked to look at Tirana with the curiosity of the unknowing. an artistic medium of awareness. Students took pictures Of course, we were not alone. We were joined by the hu- to show the character of the buildings, its “programmes” manities. Such a seminar on the theory of architecture nev- and relationships. Sometimes the images supported the er stands alone; it is always accompanied by the knowledge findings of the observation, sometimes they added another that is available. It is the second – or perhaps even the first layer to the research. In any case, they enriched the meth- – explicit aim of a MA seminar to become acquainted with ods of research, led to alternative ways of looking at the the methods and methodologies, the theories and tools, “things” and showed the student’s artistic approach to the with which to think about architecture. Tools that can be buildings. transferred to other contexts. Familiarising ourselves with Instead of enjoying their semester break, students spent these tools, learning about terms and definitions, is the the last weeks of their holidays working with texts and core of scholarly work and sometimes a hard job – espe- images, transferring theory and practice, thinking and dis- cially for students of architecture who are largely possess cussing, watching and writing in a coherent whole. Each artistic, technical and practical training. Thus, the seminar group mastered the task to find a specific way of bringing focused on working with texts, formulating research ques- ANT and architecture together. This publication is the result tions, conducting research and composing a scholarly text. of their hard work. And in all of these tasks, the students were instructed to This book is a guidebook to the political networks of se- work independently. lected architectural structures in Tirana. It reflects the This book is the result of an intensive process of reading, student’s personal encounter with Tirana on 15 and 16 June thinking, discussing, researching and writing. We started 2019. Just like other guidebooks, it might serve to get an in April reading three texts on the Actor Network Theory overview of what might be worth visiting. In contrast to (ANT), the theoretical lens which would serve as the basis of those it delves deeply into the subject of research, thus our research in Tirana. Those texts by Bruno Latour (Latour the book is still an academic work. Using texts and images Introduction 1991), Alfred Gell (Gell 1998) and Albena Yaneva (Yaneva it creates itself a virtual network of relations. Introduction 2017) were the keys to the ANT thinking. The purpose was I am very proud of what the students accomplished. It not to become experts of ANT, but to become acquainted was quite a difficult semester; not only did they apply an with the key concepts and understand this specific way of interdisciplinary approach – sociologist architecture the- thinking. It is also worth noting that we consulted texts by ory and photography – but we used English as our working other authors which were available on Moodle and influ- language, students formed a heterogenous group of archi- enced our work – e.g. Thomas Gieryn (Gieryn 2002), Ignacio tecture, mediaarchitecture, urbanism students and worked Farias & Thomas Bender (Farias/Bender 2010) and Kjetil under time pressure. From the beginning, this seminar was Fallan (Fallan 2008). ANT was our tool for establishing con- an experiment. Some things can certainly be improved, oth- tact with Tirana’s architecture, for learning about its history, er things worked out quite well. I suppose all of us have function, people and materiality and for thinking about the learned a lot in different ways. communicative relationships of these “things”. Six groups of two to three students worked on one build- We scheduled our research expedition for two days – 15 ing each. Following this structure, the book opens with a and 16 June 2019. Prepared in advance with presentations short introduction to the urban planning of Tirana by Clara held in Weimar on the history, nature, culture and politics Blasius, Isabella Pullmann and Katharina Thurow. The arti- of Albania and individual research on built structures, the cle highlights the wide variety of influences that shaped the students observed the architecture, talked to pedestrians city in the 20th century – the Ottomans, Austrians, Italians, and – most importantly – received support from Albanian even the Germans, and in the second half of the century, students who voluntarily spent two days working with us. the communist regime. A To familiarise ourselves with the built structures, another The next piece by the same authors focuses on Hotel Dajti. A medium was introduced: photography. While still in Wei-