An Installation in Four Acts. Education Ideals Building the City

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Structuralism: An Installation in Four Acts is the first presen-tation on the subject. It is the starting-point of a research project mining the historical dimensions of 1960s structuralism while investigating its potential for today. An Installation in Four Acts con -centrates on the event of Dutch Structuralism in archi-tecture. For 2016 a follow-up project is planned: Total Space, which looks into the interdiscipli-nary aspects of structuralism as well as its international context.

programmeLandscape and Interior

fi leOngoing research on

Structuralism

projectStructuralism

curatorDirk van den Heuvel /

Jaap Bakema Study Centre

exhibition designLada Hrak / Bureau LADA

graphic designPatrick Coppens

An Installation in Four ActsEducation, Ideals, Building, the City

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The Event City of Dutch StructuralismDirk van den Heuvel

Dutch Structuralism was born from a unique confluence of people and events in the city of Amsterdam in the second half of the 1950s. Aldo van Eyck and Joop Hardy were teaching at the Academy of Architecture, a meeting place for Dutch modern architecture already before the Second World War. After the war, the school had moved to a new building at the Waterlooplein in the midst of the former Jewish quarter of the city, which would see dramatic changes in the next decades due to large scale modernization pro-jects such as the new town hall and opera house, the construction of the new underground and the fierce street fights over the course of urban renewal policies. With a relatively open studio system, the Academy was quite more advanced compared to the Delft University of Technology with its system of year professors who controlled the curriculum. Piet Blom and Joop van Stigt were among the most outstanding students who together with their teachers would fanatically pursue a new approach in architectural design, albeit rather intuitively as well. At the same time, Van Eycks Municipal Orphanage was under construction at the periphery. Joop van Stigt was Van Eycks supervisor and right hand during its construction. His role was especially critical after Van Eyck was denied access to the construction site after some serious conflicts with the client and builder that involved among others the tearing down of bits of the building by Van Eyck during nightly visits because they werent in accordance with his ideas.

When the Forum journal got a new editorial board in 1959 spearheaded by Jaap Bakema and Aldo van Eyck together with Joop Hardy, Jurriaan Schrofer, Gert Boon, and the young graduates Dick Apon and Herman Hertzberger, the new ideas found a platform that would dramatically enlarge its impact. The editors would initially meet at the

Academy before moving their weekly evenings to Hertzbergers attic space. Exchange between teachers and students would be a recurring motif in the Forum issues. The first one, largely com-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 of Team 10 from the perspective of its Dutch members, while it also made a strong plea for a new (or other) approach to architecture and plan-ning. Surprisingly, Van Eyck proposed Piet Bloms student work as the ultimate and didactic example of this other idea, which was summarized with the evocative image of a casbah organise.

The Algerian Kasbah was but one of the many ideal cities that can be found in the pages of the Forum journal of those years between 1959 and 1963, with a delayed issue published as late as 1967. Dogon villages, Pueblos, Mediterranean scenes of both urbane equipoise and lively socia-bility, amphitheatres such as the one in Arles, Diocletians Palace in Split and Joseph Rykwerts Idea of a Town. Still, the ultimate city of Forum was undoubtedly the city of Amsterdam itself, par-ticularly so for the students it seems. For instance, both Blom and Van Stigt were born in Amsterdam. The Dutch capital was then still dirty, worn down, full of slums, but also brimming with everyday, urban life. The old working class neighborhoods of Jor-daan and de Pijp were sources of inspiration in the search for another architecture that was to bring about a new kind of social space beyond the clini-cal hygienic city of straightforward functionalism.

Social Space The notion of an inclusive, social space is one of the more appealing aspects of the struc-turalist discourse in architecture. Especially Herman Hertzberger would consistently elaborate this notion. When talking about structuralism or social space Hertzberger resists any definition in scientific or disciplinary terms, yet he tirelessly describes the phenomenon by countless observa-tions of all sorts of instances how people behave and how they appropriate space. The social of structuralism was tailored against sheer econom-

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An installation in four actsEducation, Ideals, Building, the City

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Aldo van Eyck, Municipal Orphanage, Amsterdam (19551960)

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ization of our cities and everyday lives. Also then in the 1950s, when Aldo van Eyck was building his Municipal Orphanage in Amsterdam and when he and the editors of the Forum journal laid out the story of another idea, the social and so-called humanizing of architecture and urban planning was part of a project to counter global moderni-zation and the homogenizing of urban spaces. So, what could be said about the kind of social space as proposed by the Dutch structuralists? What sort of architecture and what sort of city comes to the fore in their writings and projects?

The very word structuralism can be called an afterthought or post-rationalism. While the term originates from anthropology and linguistics (Lvi-Strauss and De Saussure in particular), it wasnt until the 1970s when it became current in architecture. Van Eyck would rather talk about the configurative and Piet Blom spoke of casbah-ism and structure. Hertzberger seemed to have pro-posed the term quite early on in the late 1960s, after which Arnulf Lchinger popularized the term. It might be argued that we are looking at a chain of reinventions: with each new definition the idea of structuralism in architecture is renewed as well. The validity of the term is still disputed today, since any unambiguous definition seems hard to achieve. Still, there are a few reasons why the term Structuralism might help to understand the shift in architectural thinking that was brought about from the 1950s onward, and which hasnt been absorbed completely until today.

First of all, there is the new awareness that archi-tecture is embedded, that it forms a part of the larger social structure that is society. That insight comes from anthropology. This might sound like kicking in an open door to some, but it is not. Con-ventional wisdom thinks of architecture (and cities) as accommodating individuals and communities. From this perspective the search for an archi-tecture of social space gets too often reduced to the idea of architecture as a frame for society and everyday life, a structure that accommodates indeed. The most utopian (and megalomaniac) proposals derive from such fallacy: universal structures that are open for all sorts of events, temporary infill and human appropriation, as in the case of the most radical examples of Constant and Yona Friedman, but the same can be said of some of the projects of Piet Blom and Jaap Bakema.

The reverse is usually overlooked or forgotten, namely that human activities and social institu-tions bring architecture into the world. To rethink structuralism in architecture and its specific achievement, it would be a most productive approach to also think of architecture itself as an event or piece of infill. It was Aldo van Eyck who mastered such reciprocal thinking like nobody else. His proposition of a city as a large house and a house as a small city is but the most famous and straightforward example. The sculpture pavilion in Sonsbeek (1966) is perhaps one of its most poetic demonstrations, in which the notions of structure and event are reversed, with the structure of the pavilion being derived from the events created by the encounters between the sculptures who inhabit the pavilion and the temporary visitors of the public.

The City of Events The city built up from a concatenation of events and encounters is a recurrent motif in structuralism. A building is no longer conceived of as an autonomous, solitary object, but as a piece of fabric enmeshed in a web of interrelations: between individuals, communities and their daily routines, between use and territory, built fabric and social fabric, or to put it in Ruth Benedicts terms in patterns of culture. Alison Smithson called it mat-building.

Within the history of Dutch Structuralism, or its wider context of the last CIAMs and the Team 10 discourse on the future direction of modern archi-tecture, one finds many variants based on these two trends: one approach that seeks to accom-modate the social and its events by providing a structure, and another that conceives itself as an event part of a larger structure. The former is the more conventional one and is commonly associ-ated with the formal elaborations of structuralism, in particular Van Eycks Orphanage, Piet Bloms Kasbah in Hengelo, or Hertzbergers Centraal Beheer office building in Apeldoorn. The latter is the more irritant approach that was made opera-tive in the political debates and street fights over the course of urban renewal in the historic inner cities, Amsterdam in particular.

The formal characteristics of Dutch Structuralism present a paradox, since the basic starting point is the classic avant-garde notion that form is not an a priori given, but a result. Yet, looking back one cannot help but recognize a structuralist formal language based on the multiplying of small units into larger patterns or structures by way of all sorts of serialist compositional operations. One could even state that today we still speak of structur-alism in architecture, exactly because of its very formal specificity: the idea of labyrinthine clarity and the casbah organise. It is also a naked kind of architecture, with untreated concrete, natural wood, bare bricks, that not only invite but actually

aim to provoke the user to appropriate the unfin-ished spaces of structuralism. The user is not just accommodated (as if such neutrality can exist in architecture), but actually forced into a certain mode of operating.

Within the urban renewal practices in Amsterdam, one finds an even more socially and politically charged approach that might be termed the second moment of Dutch Structuralism. In itself, the story is by now quite a familiar one, albeit rather stereotypical. During the 1960s, Amsterdam became a hotbed of anti-authoritarian activism and experimentation with Provo being the most radical exponent, clearing the way for the squat movement of the late 1970s and early 1980s. The inner-city and the historic districts were in desperate need of modernization. The large-scale schemes for new office development and motorway construction as planned for by the city raised immense protests. The construction of the underground, which was accompanied by massive demolition in the historic Nieuwmarkt neighbor-hood, triggered the start of street revolts against the city government. The city and its planning bureaucracy were forced to drop the initial plans and adopt a new approach. Supported by the local citizens, Aldo van Eyck together with students from the Amsterdam Academy of Architecture, espe-cially his later office partner Theo Bosch, would bring an entirely different approach to the recon-struction of the neighborhood. As early as 1970,

In 1967, the city of Amsterdam organ-ized an open competition to end the debates on a new town hall, which had lasted for decades already. 803 entries were submitted from all over the world. Among other things the competition meant a breakthrough for Dutch Structuralism since the new approach was recognized as an alternative for the large-scale projects for the Amsterdam inner city that were planned at the time.

The projects of Herman Hertzberger and John Habraken show two very different tendencies how to deal with the urban context. Hertzberger pro-posed a building that is a metaphoric image of a small city with a grid of small towers and inner streets and in the centre a handful of monumental volumes that house the ceremonial and democratic functions. Its diagonal positioning sets it apart from the old fabric of the city. Habraken based his design on the urban structure of the city; the construction of the new town hall, its measurements and zoning were derived from the way the urban blocks are divided up in smaller plots. His design is organized around two streets and two squares following the basic morphology of the site. A basic structure of party walls is provided. In his view each city department could hire its own architect to build their offices within this open structure.



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piecemeal and mixed development together with a highly differentiated housing typology and restric-tion of car access was to set the new standard of urban development.

The City of Architecture The new approach implied a city made out of architecture and not so much an architecture of the city, a proposition which was to become internationally popular among architects and urban planners mostly due to Aldo Rossis book of the same title and published in 1966. To comply with any hypothesized disciplinary autonomy and to follow the inherent hierarchies of urbanism and architecture was anathema to Van Eyck cum suis. To start with architecture and the small scale was an intent provocation as to resist the mech-anisms of planning and any top-down approach. Architecture was to be not just an act of the imagination to go beyond functionalism, but in this struggle for the city it also aimed to be an irritant to prevent assimilation in the smooth politics of a post-industrial, global era. The projects built in the Nieuwmarkt neighborhood invariably testify of this contrary mentality. It is an architecture that provokingly reappropriated the old city, a series of events and happenings that still highlight the pattern of former gaps in the urban fabric caused by the earlier demolitions.

If big institutional and corporate buildings would propose to fuck context (in the famous words of Koolhaas), these small pieces of city events clearly state to fuck autonomy of the architectural disci-pline and the institutions that assign architecture to this sort of space in the larger dispositif of the power structure. From this, it also becomes logic that any classical approach in composition is left behind in this event-architecture: the cultivation of awkwardly unstylish facades and their materializa-tion, the unorthodox use of colors, they all signal the unruly kind of urban lifestyles of the period, just as they are a demonstration of a democracy of popular dissent rather than the current neo-liberal consensus. With the projects for the Nieuwmarkt neighborhood, most of which are still considered controversial within the architectural profession, Dutch Structuralism seems to find its ultimate urban definition. Structuralism itself becomes

embedded, a piece of the accumulation of histori-cal experience that makes up the European city, in this case the city of Amsterdam.

In a way, the numerous designs of playgrounds by Van Eyck, which he started to realize from 1947 onward, already held the seeds of such a defini-tion. The events created by playing children and supported by the configurations of elementary play furniture were to regenerate the fabric of post-war Amsterdam, both the old, historic neighborhoods and the new districts on the outskirts of the city. Still, the project of playgrounds aimed for a new harmony, such a project of reconciliation seems gone in the practice of urban renewal.

Ultimately, it was Piet Blom who delivered the endpoint of the city of events in his project for the Oude Haven in Rotterdam. He was called in by the city to redirect the development of the inner city into a more urban and differentiated environment that had to substitute a planned motorway and bridge landing. Bloms approach leads to a still unsurpassable gesture one might claim (hence its quality as an endpoint). He succeeded in combin-ing the populist with the experimental, pop art with the historicist. Since the site was almost a terrain vague, only the so-called White House office tower and a row of old houses had survived the German bombardment of the Second World War, Blom decided to create a collage of faux city fragments by his own hand. The whole project consists of four separate projects all designed by Blom with the one of the Cube Houses as the most prominent and famous one. Together with the library by Van den Broek and Bakema on the north edge of the site, a vast collection of structuralist typologies is realized here. A collage of interconnected bits and pieces of clusters, Kasbahs, streets-in-the-air and terraced, horizontal landscapes, each fragment an example of the house-city analogy. Together, they create at least two big spaces for encoun-ter, the dock of the Oude Haven with its bustle of cafs and restaurants and the eerily quiet raised plaza under the cluster of Cube Houses that cross the busy street Blaak. Especially the latter, a very bright place because of the omnipresent yellow and the light coming down through the openings of the roof of cubes still defies any categorization.

H. Hertzberger 1967

J. Habraken 1967

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Speak, Memory!Guus Beumer

I was a student when doubt had already made itself felt. In the mid-1970s I walked into the Social Academy at Westblaak, Rotterdam an 18-year old, embarking on my studies. You might say the social academy was one, if not the ideological center of the welfare state. Not only intended to shape the critical contours of everything that social could achieve. It also provided the sup-port staff of social workers, community workers and socio-cultural workers for an intricate infra-structure of temporary refuges/shelters, crisis-, community- and youth centers, and the like. It was the time when the social aspect was sup-posed to function as the dynamic motor for a new society, aided by architecture and urban planning as agents of change. The academy building, more or less across the street from the architecture office of Van den Broek and Bakema in Posthoo-rnstraat, had the typical aesthetic of its day, with endless gravel-screed floors, flanked in places by pale grey walls of aerated concrete slabs. In addition, the interior was characterized, apart from a huge rope wall-hanging, by pragmatism. Looking back, it was mainly the vast numbers of washing machines (where else could a student do the laundry?) and the white Formica tables littered with plastic beakers that were typical appointments. From the very first day and ultimately I spent four years there every standpoint, every political truth, every personal ambition was analyzed, discussed and in the end rejected, so that everything seemed to be permanently in a state of flux, never to solidify. The first day all the lecturers were on strike, often themselves only four, five years older than myself; they refused to continue as lesson-merchants, demanding that the student take the responsibility for his own learning program. In my final weeks, the plenary meetings the last vestige of an institu-tional structure were dominated by paralyzing criticism of the individual character of the social infrastructure, which from the inside out.

Why am I writing this, why do precisely these anecdotes surface when Im asked about the background of Het Nieuwe Instituuts choice for long-term research into structuralism? For me, the reason lies in the analogy: I was a student when doubt had already made itself felt, doubt about welfare work, doubt about a social infrastructure, doubt about the eternal polarity between bot-tom-up and top-down, doubt about architecture and, by extension, urban renewal and community work as an instrument for social engineering and, of course, doubt about the idea of an equitable society. Doubt as regards the social aspect that Hans Achterhuis was to formulate brilliantly in De markt voor welzijn en geluk [The Wellbeing and Prosperity Market] (1979). And those doubts, that were so at odds with the ideas of the post-war reconstruction genera-tion like Van Eyck and Bakema, inevitably formed the gateway to that other ideology, that of the market, of the consumer. I also remember the moment of intellectual release when all those reader-unfriendly publications by companies like Suhrkamp, for instance about false consciousness (1971, Wolfgang Fritz Haug, Kritik der Wahrens-thetik [Critique of Commodity Aesthetics]) made way for a more perceptive description of the superficial, which could cover every antithe-sis, and pop culture, fashion and punk were not automatically disqualified as expressions of civil proto-fascism. Nowadays, we know that that mar-ket and its endless flexibility did not provide the promised answer either, and once more a pro-ductive moment is being sought and the domain of the social, including the ideology of top-down versus bottom-up, and the possible role of design are being reassessed. Just when the polarity between market and government, between con-sumer and citizen, appears to have been abolished and we refer to a culture of convergence (Henry Jenkins), to a creative industry and the moment when the contract between the citizen as a con-sumer and the government as the market, should be revised. In other words, now is the moment when the deployment and arsenal of Structuralism are again experiencing social urgency to use it as a lens to take a fresh, yet investigative look at the present situation, with the infinite wealth of the institutes archive providing a helping hand.

The artist and cultural philosopher Joop Hardy (19181983) exerted a major influence on the shaping of ideas within Dutch Structuralism. He was an editor of the journal Forum, a tutor at the Academy of Architecture in Amsterdam, and later a professor at Delft University of Technology (next to being Director of the Art Academy in Enschede, AKI). He published very little and lives on largely in the stories of con-temporaries. The archive of the Academy of Architecture contains an occasional lec-ture text such as the one published here.

Hardys teaching was associative, firing the imagination. He liked to refer to Andr Mal-rauxs idea of a muse imaginaire, which he defined as the simultaneous presence of all traditions from all corners of the world and from all periods. He was famous for his extensive collection of slides, his imagetheque, featuring images from the decadent Viennese fin-de-sicle period to the natives of Mekong.

Students were confronted in his classes with a cross section from the world of an-thropology, psychoanalysis and art history, from Ruth Benedicts Patterns of Culture and Nikolaus Pevsners Pioneers of Modern Design to Johan Huizingas Homo Ludens.

A V A N T - G A R D E

Introduction by J. HardyDelivered onSaturday 8 February 1964

Ladies and Gentlemen,

When the three items planned for the I 10 exhibition:

small exhibition relating to the twenties and thirties2 or more seminarsexcursion

were being prepared, the Dutch monthly Goed Wonen got Simon Vinkenoog to conduct a survey on the concept avant-garde.

The survey revealed complete con-fusion concerning that concept. So it seemed like a good idea to focus attention on the term avant-garde at the start of this talk, since an evalua-tion of the twenties and thirties greatly depends on how the term is inter-preted. Also, it offers an opportunity to

scrutinize post-war avant-garde, which may or may not have existed, and link it up with the present day, thus avoid-ing all too pronounced a historical or museological attitude vis--vis the interwar period. In order to liven up the discussion, there is also a small exhibition com-prising three partitions devoted to the post-1945 avant-garde with a view to highlighting a specific mood or couleur locale.

Avant-garde / Advance-guard: it implies something must follow: a group, a crowd. That group calls its predecessor the avant-garde. Someone sees himself as a precursor, pioneer, trailblazer of an idea, an idealistic group. It sees itself as avant-gardist of a society, community, partnership. The avant-garde plays its part for the guard, the upholders, the citi-zens, the mainstream admirers. For the avant-gardist the fact of being avant-gardist is a social role.

Think of Brecht, a photo of whom is pinned up here, and of the socio-an-archistic tenor of his early pieces and the man himself, who took hours in the morning to fix his curiously-cut hair onto his skull with water. And his carefully selected cap all of which was intended to underline his position as precursor and trail-blazer.

Think of Dada and the role every member had to play in the propa-ganda circus.

Think of the Futurists and Surrealists and all the other activist groups and revolutionary circles who, with their art, as well as their actions and behav-iour, pressed for a sea-change of Man and society.

Think too of the anarchists, the big-gest of all social idealists.

Think of the Bauhaus with its ethic of material and technology, and passion for instructing, guiding, educating.

All this evidences an optimistic social idealism that frequently appears in highly exhibitionist guise, com-plemented by the voyeurism of the bourgeois and the art lover.

J. Hardy 1964 J. Hardy 1964

On the face of it, the present-day avant-garde, the existence of which I acknowledge, a priori, differs primarily from that of the pre-war period in a social sense. It does recruit support by way of stencilled leaflets, but other than that it is resigned and does not compete for societys goodwill. Existentialist, and very aware of beat and hip freeloading off an organism that they despise and deny, but thank heavens without feelings of guilt. They benefit from a situation to achieve a certain modality.

Art is a term for the guard, for the guardians, the tenacious, the con-servers, the last of the Mohicans and, lastly, the OASers.* It has been replaced, not by imagery still a romantic watchword but by alive inter-est, interior-ity, reacting time and again to the expressivity of reality, the world, the occurrence. Anyone singling out expressivity alone (so noncommittally) loses out. When a small sect is in, it operates on the fringe of a society, it is completely out, outside, exterior, status, status symbol, welfare state, sunshine consumer, in word (and I hope the contempt is clearly evident): tourist. A tourist, even in his own city and among the status symbols sur-rounding him, even in his own home.

This touristy world is ruled by hard-boiled political gangsters, who control the entire arena of manipulable reality. In contrast with those power-brokers are the softies the marihuana, hash, and L.S.D. boys and girls, who maintain their shaky existence until they are perfidiously absorbed in the prosperity camp. Slapdash Juliette Greco was one of the first to advance from her concrete basement to the luxury hotel. Jean Gents story demonstrates that not even prison can offer sufficient pro-tection. Colin Wilson became a literary insider with his book The Outsider. We might be cynical and say: its always manipulation, one with orgasms, another with power, and in the empty in-between, the intellectual manipulates sacred reason as the only criterion for his freely-rambling criticism.

Someone believing in something, is nave and, since 1800 (after Roman-ticism) has no raison dtre except as a Sunday painter, but he has no longer been of interest since Rous-seau the customs officer either. Someone who believes in nothing is not a nihilist (since nihilism is a happy feeling), but a cynic Someone who takes action is a criminal (Goethe), although, accord-ing to Sartre it isnt bad if you dirty your hands. Someone who doesnt take action is not a wise man, but an acces-sory. Someone who pursues something is fixated and mentally doomed. Someone who acts normally is a conformist, but he who acts abnor-mally because its the done thing is a conformist of nonconformity. Someone who acts normally because that isnt done, is a noncon-formist of conformism. Someone who displays power (power is inherently evil, Burckhardt) is a fascist.

Someone who abhors power is not a pacifist (because it goes with the idealism of the twenties and thirties), but a yobbish individual. Someone who creates a place wherever he may be, is an enviable individual. But he who creates places everywhere where people have to be, resembles a terrorist more than an architect. What does architecture look like when designed from the perspective of a sleeping bag.

When, in our total negation (of both the chair and the city) we go looking for allies allies prior to 1945 we discover Jarry and Dada to start with. With Ubu, pataphysics is the splendid simultaneity of physical phynance [finance] and merde [shit]. And with Dada, its Marcel Duchamps foremost, humblest gesture the beer mat. It was preceded by the spectac-ular bicycle wheel; the urinal and the bottle rack followed. It not only meant art must exist, art is manifest, but also represented

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J. Hardy 1964

the reality of the beer mat compared with the reality-deficient artwork, the compactness of cardboard compared with the emptiness of art. What Duchamp proclaimed was: thanks to the willingness the deci-sion, choice, gesture all ready-made art, i.e. baptized objects, that has lost its innocence because of its selec-tion, and can, therefore, enter into a persons imaginary world. In 1960 that position was taken as the premise of neo-dadaists or neo-Merz la Rauschenberg, and the neo-realists in Paris.

In a reaction to the weariness, the fatigue vis--vis lyrical abstraction, abstract expressionism, tachisme, action painting and vitalism, sym-bols whose value could no longer be defined, whose forms had lost their enchantment and magic, that (as showman-like material-aesthetic, industrial mannerism) had been drawn into the realm of affluence and chic luxury a kind of Domus mentality. Then there are the everyday problems, the everyday conflict with a social reality that is becoming increasingly independent and threat-ening propelled by an ever more powerfully mechanized civilization to destroy the individual and cause him to abandon simple, individual and instructive needs. As an exponent of all those who are in danger of being overwhelmed, Nor-man Mailer says: that sacrifice is too great for a civilization that has moved only a short distance from barbarism.

As a reaction to the ambiguity of all the marks, notches, tattoos, sen-tences, letters, signs, craters, sores and burns, the wounding or vital actions, the products of accident and neglect, only those things remained for which one held oneself responsible. Informal was also ambiguous. As Henk Peeters wrote in the exhibition catalogue for Herman de Vries at Metz: A considerable austerity set in and, with that purism of the informal, we crossed the threshold to a new period. In my opinion, the greatest purism could already be found in Yves Kleins work, in the monochrome of his mechanically applied industrial blue. In that perceivable emptiness, in

that minimum of personal intervention, we found the source of 0 = zero.

From there, the multitude of new movements began: architecture of air sculpture of fire moved movement (Tinguely) snare pictures (Spoerri)

fixation of reality, unveiling of inti-macy dcollage

The solidity of New Realism that anti-symbolic, anti-romantic, anti-aes-thetic, anti-cubist, anti-baroque and anti-abstract, but pro-social or pro-so-ciological reality teaches us that the world of things produces a permanent image and that, thanks to choice, can be elevated to a work of art.

That interpretation of life as pure expression, as a great happening, has taken poetic adventure to a new level. It is no longer a noncommittal game, but an existential matter.

Making his own life an instrument of his liberation (the link to Zen is clear) and assuming the responsibility for the existence of every object that I raise up because of its expressivity. (Art is showing, never explaining.) This is about a post-existentialist appropriation of the world of things. The victory over nausea, the positive continuation of the roman-chose of the force des choses to neo-constructivism that is in evidence everywhere. A conclusive step on the way to the conclusive conquest of the world as the beginning and end of all meaning.

A. The avant-garde between the two world wars was committed to society, idealist regarding technology, pro-gress, the salvation and liberation of mankind imbued with an ideal world empty of things. After the existential catharsis of emptiness, loneliness, boredom, disgust and the demise of aesthetic categories and artistic blue-prints comesB. the post-1945 avant-garde, com-mitted to itself and, in addition, to the world of things, matter and objects. They are small, almost closed communities juxtaposed to an open society which absorbs everything that

submits, adapts, socializes. That includes pursuing the art theme the open museum that admits every manifestation, attracts every event and, in doing so, neutral-izes, invalidates it.

Through S. Giedion we are acquainted with architectures relation with suprematists, constructivists, neoplas-ticists, purists, geometric abstracts, or architecture as a cubist artwork. The connection with Dada and surrealists has always been awkward. The nausea, alienation and the whole process of appropriation, of integration and identification of anti-roman, roman chose, Pro-Ro-mane, nouvelle vague, cinma vrit, modern poetry to facilitate an existence among obscure, no longer interpretable things has passed archi-tecture by.

If the poet is the bad conscience of his time (Saint-John Perse), the architect is, by definition, the optimis-tic conscience. The New Objectivity testified to that. But in the end the architect identified himself so much with the current state of society, its superficial problems and superficial optimism, that architectural differences acquired characteristics of superficial differ-entiation, and most architects can be defined as waste-makers.

I hope to have given sufficient offence to provoke a stimulating discussion. One that will have first to determine its own position before judgement can be made on the words of the twenties and thirties. After all, this is not about abstrac-tions like space, interpenetration, immaterialization, simultaneity, et cetera, but about a reality that exists outside all art, but of which, through art, we must first get a conception.

J. Hardy

* Organisation de lArme Secrte, active in Algeria from 19611962 [editors note].





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ETEN

CE

AN

D

PER

FOR

MA

NC

E IN

S

TRU

CTU

RA

LIS

T B

UIL

DIN

GS

Dur

ing

the

Str

uctu

ralis

m

exhi

biti

on, w

eekl

y 's

alon

s' w

ere

held

to

disc

uss

vari

ous

aspe

cts

of s

truc

tura

lism

wit

h ex

pert

s in

a

publ

ic s

etti

ng.

Aft

er t

he fi

rst

salo

n on

Dut

ch

Str

uctu

ralis

m, a

n e-

mai

l cor

re-

spon

denc

e de

velo

ped

betw

een

cura

tor

Dir

k va

n de

n H

euve

l, re

sear

cher

Pie

t Vol

laar

d, a

nd

Volu

me

edit

or A

rjen

Oos

ter -

man

dis

cuss

ing

the

succ

ess

of

stru

ctur

alis

m's

the

ory

and

form

al

lang

uage

on

the

one

hand

, and

th

e ac

tual

per

form

ance

of

stru

c -tu

ralis

t bu

ildin

gs o

n th

e ot

her.

One

of

the

gues

ts, P

iet V

olla

ard

men

tion

ed a

less

er k

now

n pr

o -je

ct o

f H

erm

an H

ertz

berg

er: t

he

com

mun

ity

cent

re D

e S

chal

m in

D

even

ter,

desi

gned

in 1

972

and

built

bet

wee

n 19

74 a

nd 1

976,

as

an e

xam

ple

of f

aile

d S

truc

tur -

alis

m t

o hi

ghlig

ht t

he li

mit

s of

st

ruct

ural

ism

in a

rchi

tect

ure.

On

26 S

ep. 2

014

, at

00:1

5

Pie

t Vo

llaar

d w

rote

:

Gen

tlem

en,

The

Dev

ente

r p

roje

ct is

inte

rest

-in

g fo

r its

line

ar, o

pen

, min

imal

st

ruct

ure,

tha

t ca

n b

e ex

tend

ed

(by

the

inha

bita

nts

of

cour

se).

A

bit

like

the

mul

titud

e o

f m

egas

truc

ture

s in

the

196

0s; a

co

nstr

uctiv

e su

pp

ort

(a

linea

r sk

ylig

ht in

bet

wee

n tw

o r

ow

s o

f

sup

po

rts)

allo

win

g cl

ip-o

n ex

ten -

sio

ns. T

he p

roje

ct p

rese

ntat

ion

in

Arn

olf

Lch

inge

r , H

erm

an H

ertz

-b

erge

r 19

59

1986

sta

rts

with

fo

ur

cart

oo

nesq

ue d

raw

ings

of

four

p

hase

s o

f ap

pro

pri

atio

n. S

o f

ar s

o go

od

. But

the

nex

t p

ages

sho

w

the

co

mp

lete

d c

om

mun

ity c

ente

r (w

as t

he p

roce

ss o

f ap

pro

pri

atio

n al

read

y fin

ishe

d d

urin

g d

esig

n?

;-).

Its

no

t m

entio

ned

in t

he t

ext

if p

artic

ipat

ion

of

the

inha

bita

nts

of

the

neig

hbo

rho

od

was

par

t o

f th

e p

roce

ss, b

ut t

he d

escr

iptio

n su

gges

ts t

hat

the

inha

bita

nts

them

selv

es o

rder

ed p

refa

b st

ruct

ures

and

ad

ded

tho

se t

o th

e b

asic

str

uctu

re. I

t is

unc

lear

if

this

is w

hat

real

ly h

app

ened

, but

b

oth

the

aut

hor

and

the

arc

hite

ct

(I p

resu

me)

wer

e d

isap

po

inte

d w

ith t

he e

nd r

esul

t. "T

he r

esul

t is

d

isap

po

intin

g co

mp

ared

to

the

gr

eate

r sp

atia

l po

ssib

ilitie

s th

at

an a

rchi

tect

mig

ht h

ave

off

ered

th

em."

Ap

pro

pri

atio

n w

asn

t to

b

e le

ft t

o t

he u

ser,

evid

ently

, and

H

ertz

ber

ger

wo

uld

kee

p t

his

in

his

ow

n ha

nds

fro

m n

ow

on.

A

po

t p

lant

on

a p

arap

et h

ere

and

ther

e is

per

mis

sib

le, b

ut a

dd

ing

an u

gly

pre

fab

ro

om

is d

ow

nrig

ht

dis

app

oin

ting

.

Had

to

thi

nk o

f C

edri

c P

rice

s

Inte

r-A

ctio

n C

entr

e in

Lo

n -d

on

(197

7) t

oo

, one

of

the

few

p

roje

cts

he a

ctua

lly b

uilt.

Thi

s IA

C a

lso

co

nsis

ts o

f a

stru

c -tu

ral s

upp

ort

(in

thi

s ca

se a

w

ell-

cons

erve

d o

pen

-end

ed

stee

l co

nstr

uctio

n) f

or

whi

ch

user

s co

uld

pro

duc

e th

eir

ow

n ad

diti

ons

. Ced

ric

was

so

mew

hat

smar

ter t

han

Her

man

by

pro

vid

-in

g a

cata

logu

e o

f av

aila

ble

off

th

e sh

elf

cont

aine

rs a

nd

uni

ts. A

nd if

Im

no

t m

ista

ken,

he

incl

uded

a c

om

put

er p

rogr

am

to g

uid

e th

e p

roce

ss o

f ap

pro

-p

riat

ion.

The

idea

was

tha

t th

is

wel

l-co

ated

ste

el s

truc

ture

wo

uld

out

last

the

firs

t p

hase

plu

g-in

s an

d b

e ad

just

ed o

ver t

ime.

And

th

ats

exa

ctly

wha

t ha

pp

ened

. H

ow

ever

, by

the

year

200

0 it

had

bec

om

e a

corr

od

ed m

ess

as

resu

lt o

f th

e o

ver-

enth

usia

stic

ex

tens

ion

and

den

sific

atio

n by

its

use

rs in

co

mb

inat

ion

with

in

tens

ive

use;

des

troy

ed b

y its

o

wn

succ

ess.

Whe

n C

edri

c fa

ns p

rote

sted

ag

ains

t d

emo

litio

n, it

was

Pri

ce

him

self

who

sai

d t

hat

dem

olit

ion

was

the

bet

ter

op

tion.

The

str

uc-

ture

had

out

lived

its

time.

And

so

it w

as d

emo

lishe

d, i

nclu

din

g th

e st

eel c

ons

truc

tion

that

was

stil

l in

goo

d s

hap

e; m

ayb

e th

ey r

euse

d it

else

whe

re.

Pie

t

On

29 S

ep. 2

014

, at

11:5

2

Dir

k va

n d

en H

euve

l wro

te:

Than

ks P

iet,

Her

tzb

erge

r d

id s

how

thi

s p

ro-

ject

as

an e

xam

ple

of

failu

re in

hi

s le

ctur

es a

t TU

Del

ft. B

ut it

s fa

ilure

is p

rim

arily

on

the

leve

l of

bea

utifu

l fo

rm, o

r le

ts s

ay o

f th

e la

ngua

ge o

f ar

chite

ctur

e its

elf.

As

com

mun

ity c

ente

r, it

still

see

ms

to p

erfo

rm w

ell a

nd a

s p

roce

ss it

is

suc

cess

ful t

oo

; new

and

firm

er

add

itio

ns w

ere

add

ed, a

s G

oo

gle

stre

et v

iew

sho

ws

:-)

Bes

t, D

irk

objectnummer /inventarisnummer yeararchitect / author objectnummer /inventarisnummer yeararchitect / author



Pla

n o

f t

Kar

rega

t sh

ow

ing

op

en a

cces

s an

d f

unct

ion

mix

: tw

o s

cho

ols

, sho

ps,

and

a c

om

mun

ity

cent

er

Her

man

Her

tzbe

rger

, Co

mm

unity

Cen

ter

D

e S

chal

m, D

even

ter

(197

4)A

ntic

ipat

ed d

evel

op

men

t

18 19

On

30

Sep

. 201

4, a

t 23

:18

A

rjen

Oo

ster

man

wro

te:

Can

I ad

d H

ertz

ber

gers

Bo

uwR

AI

hous

ing

in A

lmer

e fr

om

199

0 to

thi

s fa

scin

atin

g se

ries

? It

an

ticip

ated

ext

ensi

on

with

out

p

resc

rib

ed e

xten

sio

n m

od

ules

(by

p

rovi

din

g ad

diti

ona

l fo

und

atio

n if

I rec

all c

orr

ectly

). T

hat

cont

rib

-ut

es t

o a

mo

re n

uanc

ed p

ictu

re

of

Her

tzb

erge

r an

d e

xten

sio

n p

erha

ps?

Arj

en O

n 1

Oct

. 201

4, a

t 13

:18

P

iet V

olla

ard

wro

te:

Hi A

rjen

,

Ser

ious

cha

nce

that

the

se

hous

es w

ere

not

exte

nded

or

chan

ged

. And

if s

o, t

hen

mo

st

likel

y d

iffer

ently

fro

m w

hat

HH

p

rovi

sio

ned

. Tha

t at

leas

t is

the

co

nclu

sio

n yo

u ca

n d

raw

fro

m

muc

h fu

rthe

r re

achi

ng a

dap

tab

le

hous

ing

in L

unet

ten

(Utr

echt

) by

S

AR

. The

ho

uses

wer

e fit

ted

out

w

ith h

igh-

tech

wal

ls t

hat

coul

d b

e sh

ifted

or

rem

ove

d w

ith a

sim

ple

cl

ick

syst

em. T

his

way

it s

houl

d b

e ea

sy t

o c

reat

e an

oth

er r

oo

m

or

a b

igge

r sp

ace.

Occ

upan

ts

also

rec

eive

d e

xtra

wal

ls. Y

ears

la

ter,

hard

ly a

nyth

ing

had

bee

n ch

ange

d a

nd t

he e

xtra

wal

ls w

ere

still

sta

ndin

g id

le in

the

ir st

ora

ge.

The

dem

and

fo

r ad

just

able

ho

usin

g is

oft

en e

xagg

erat

ed.

Ap

pro

pri

atio

n is

bei

ng d

one

w

ith p

aint

, pla

nts,

fur

nitu

re, a

nd

som

e p

ost

ers

on

the

wal

l. I s

ee

as p

rob

lem

tha

t so

me

arch

itect

s th

ink

they

hav

e to

pro

vid

e s

om

e-

thin

g

a s

pat

ial c

onfi

gura

tion,

a

tech

nica

l fac

ility

t

o e

nco

urag

e an

d f

acili

tate

suc

h ap

pro

pri

atio

n.

That

so

met

hing

is

oft

en p

reve

nt-

ing

exac

tly t

hat.

That

s w

hy t

he d

oo

rzo

nwo

ning

[li

tera

l tra

nsla

tion:

sun

cro

ss-

ing

hous

e; a

cro

ssw

all d

wel

ling

typ

e ro

w h

ous

e, o

f w

hich

mo

re

than

a m

illio

n w

ere

bui

ld in

the

N

ethe

rlan

ds

in t

he p

ost

WW

2 p

erio

d, P

V]

is w

orl

d c

ham

pio

n ap

pro

pri

atio

n o

ptio

ns. I

t is

the

ab

solu

te n

eutr

al h

ous

e w

itho

ut

any

arch

itect

ural

cha

ract

eris

tics

(and

stil

l with

rem

arka

ble

var

ia-

tion,

with

in t

he t

ight

lim

its o

f its

si

ze a

nd a

rchi

tect

ure

). B

ut s

om

e la

rger

siz

e an

d s

pat

ial n

eutr

ality

d

on

t ha

ve t

o r

esul

t in

a b

uild

ing

with

out

arc

hite

cto

nic

char

ac-

teri

stic

s, a

s V

an K

linge

ren

s D

e M

eerp

aal i

n D

ront

en d

emo

n -st

rate

s. It

is h

ard

ly m

ore

tha

n a

stee

l-an

d-g

lass

she

d w

ith a

fri

nge

of

amen

ities

. But

ver

y a

rchi

tec -

toni

c a

nd f

ar m

ore

ap

pro

pri

able

th

an m

any

a st

ruct

ural

ist

bui

ldin

g,

incl

udin

g va

n K

linge

ren

s o

wn

str

uctu

ralis

t t

Kar

rega

t in

Ein

d-

hove

n. I

wo

uld

nt

kno

w o

f an

oth

er

bui

ldin

g th

at a

llow

ed s

o m

any

diff

eren

t us

es w

itho

ut p

hysi

cal

adju

stm

ents

.

Tho

ugh

neut

ral,

it d

id h

ave

a cl

ever

sp

atia

l co

ncep

t w

ith ju

st

eno

ugh

(tho

ugh

som

etim

es ir

ri-

tatin

g) in

duc

emen

ts f

or

diff

eren

t us

es. T

hats

why

De

Mee

rpaa

l is

bet

ter t

han

an o

rdin

ary

shed

of

the

sam

e si

ze. A

neu

tral

alm

ost

o

kay

she

d is

no

t an

op

tion.

P

iet

On

1 O

ct. 2

014

, at

22:2

6 A

rjen

O

ost

erm

an w

rote

:

Hel

lo P

iet,

Fasc

inat

ing

exam

ple

s an

d I

end

ors

e yo

ur o

bse

rvat

ions

on

adap

tab

ility

. Hig

hly

ove

r-es

-te

emed

issu

e, I

thin

k, a

t le

ast

whe

n it

com

es t

o p

lug-

and

-pla

y ad

apta

bili

ty. M

ost

ho

uses

are

ad

apta

ble

, as

the

cont

aine

r fo

r co

nstr

uctio

n w

aste

ind

icat

es, t

hat

arri

ves

with

eve

ry n

ew o

ccup

ant

or

hous

e o

wne

r. K

itche

n an

d b

athr

oo

m a

re t

o b

e re

mo

ved

by d

efau

lt an

d m

ost

of

the

time

ther

e ar

e to

o m

any

wal

ls t

oo

. B

ut I

also

witn

ess

an in

clin

atio

n to

ext

end

the

new

pro

per

ty (

row

ho

use,

sem

i-d

etac

hed

or

sing

le

fam

ily h

ous

e). F

or

som

e re

aso

n,

peo

ple

live

in a

ho

use

that

is

too

cra

mp

ed. I

f an

op

tion,

thi

s is

so

lved

by

add

ing

a b

ackp

ack

(ext

ra fl

oo

r o

r co

nser

vato

ry).

A

nyw

ay, i

t ha

pp

ens

a lo

t an

d so

meo

ne li

ke H

ertz

ber

ger

cons

id-

ered

tha

t an

issu

e to

inco

rpo

rate

in

his

des

igns

. I t

hink

we

sho

uld

diff

eren

tiate

bet

wee

n ho

usin

g an

d a

co

mm

unity

cen

ter,

whi

ch

com

es w

ith d

iffer

ent

po

ssib

ili-

ties.

It w

oul

d b

e in

tere

stin

g to

kn

ow

if t

he t

rend

is f

or

smal

ler

apar

tmen

ts, c

ause

d b

y en

ergy

co

nsid

erat

ions

or

smal

ler

size

d fa

mili

es (

not

the

tren

d w

here

I liv

e by

the

way

; in

my

tow

n yo

u sh

oul

d h

ave

five

kid

s to

mee

t th

e no

rm).

Tha

tll b

e a

chal

leng

e fo

r ar

chite

cts,

if t

hats

wha

t is

to

com

e. N

ot

sure

if s

truc

tura

lism

is

a gr

eat

help

in f

acin

g th

at t

ask.

Che

ers,

Arj

en

On

2 O

ct. 2

014

, at

07:0

9

Dir

k va

n d

en H

euve

l wro

te:

Let

me

chip

in.

Bak

ema

s g

roei

wo

ning

en

(ext

end

able

dw

ellin

gs)

in E

ind

-ho

ven

are

ano

ther

nic

e ex

amp

le

Li

ke B

ijlsm

a, M

adel

eine

M

aask

ant,

and

Eire

en S

chre

urs

wro

te a

n ar

ticle

fo

r O

ase

abo

ut

that

a

nd if

Im

no

t m

ista

ken,

ev

eryt

hing

was

so

wel

l des

igne

d,

that

no

thin

g ha

d c

hang

ed. A

lso

a m

atte

r o

f ge

nero

us s

izin

g, t

hey

dis

cove

red

.S

truc

tura

lism

is a

bo

ut t

he

lang

uage

of

arch

itect

ure.

Suc

h a

lang

uage

is c

onn

ecte

d t

o a

ll ki

nds

of

soci

al is

sues

fl

exib

ility

no

t b

eing

the

mo

st d

eter

min

ing

one

fo

r st

ruct

ural

ism

b

ut a

t th

e en

d o

f th

e d

ay it

is a

bo

ut a

rchi

-te

ctur

e its

elf.

Wha

t ne

w la

ngua

ge

can

we

inve

nt t

o d

eal e

ffec

-tiv

ely

with

wha

t in

phi

loso

phi

cal

term

s is

cal

led

our

uni

nhab

itab

le

wo

rld

? It

is a

cul

tura

l iss

ue, n

ot

a te

chni

cal o

ne

as

far

as y

ou

can

sep

arat

e th

ese

two

of

cour

se.

Ap

pro

pri

atio

n an

d in

duc

emen

ts

for

use

are

muc

h m

ore

cen

tral

to

Str

uctu

ralis

m

and

whe

n it

com

es t

o t

hese

are

as, t

here

is

pro

bab

ly m

ore

fri

ctio

n to

be

foun

d b

etw

een

amb

itio

n an

d re

sult

than

with

reg

ard

to

flex

ibil -

ity. I

n th

e w

ork

of V

an E

yck,

firs

t an

d f

ore

mo

st. V

an E

yck

is a

n ar

t -is

t; H

ertz

ber

ger

rep

eats

tim

e an

d ag

ain

that

Van

Eyc

k d

idn

t w

ant

anyt

hing

to

cha

nge

whe

n th

e B

erla

ge In

stitu

te w

as a

bo

ut t

o o

ccup

y hi

s O

rpha

nage

in A

mst

er-

dam

. Tha

t d

oes

nt

mak

e th

is w

ork

un

inte

rest

ing,

but

co

min

g fr

om

a

com

ple

te d

iffer

ent

amb

itio

n th

an o

ne w

oul

d li

ke f

rom

an

engi

-

neer

s p

oin

t o

f vi

ew.

Pie

t, I w

oul

d li

ke t

o k

now

why

De

Mee

rpaa

l is

not

a ne

utra

l bo

x,

wha

t sp

ecifi

c in

duc

emen

ts h

ave

bee

n in

clud

ed in

its

des

ign

al

so

taki

ng in

to a

cco

unt

that

a h

ous

e is

sup

po

sed

to

be

as n

eutr

al a

s p

oss

ible

?

Bes

t, D

irk

On

02

Oct

201

4, a

t 12

:07,

P

iet V

olla

ard

wro

te:

Dir

k is

rig

ht, a

dap

tab

ility

(fle

x-ib

ility

, wha

teve

r) is

an

issu

e o

f b

uild

ing

tech

nolo

gy a

nd a

n o

bse

ssio

n fo

r ar

chite

cts

who

lik

e th

at a

spec

t in

par

ticul

ar. N

ot

som

ethi

ng e

xclu

sive

ly s

truc

tur -

alis

t. A

ltho

ugh,

one

co

uld

arg

ue

that

str

uctu

ralis

m p

icks

up

on

a cu

lture

of

chan

ge (

the

idea

o

f p

rogr

ess)

. And

tha

t cl

ashe

s w

ith p

eop

les

des

ire f

or

sta -

bili

ty (

spec

ifica

lly c

ultu

ral)

, fo

r tr

aditi

on.

Str

uctu

ralis

m h

ad li

ttle

af

finity

with

the

loca

l bui

ldin

g an

d ar

chite

ctur

e tr

aditi

on.

Why

did

A

lso

van

Eyc

k lo

ok

at t

he D

ogo

n an

d n

ot

at s

oci

ally

and

sp

atia

lly

trad

itio

nally

org

aniz

ed v

illag

es in

th

e N

ethe

rlan

ds;

the

re w

ere

still

p

lent

y o

f th

em in

the

195

0s. W

hy

trav

el t

he w

orl

d w

hen

you

can

go t

o n

earb

y re

mo

te a

reas

like

th

e ea

ster

n p

art

of

the

coun

try?

A

frai

d t

o b

e ca

lled

a t

rad

itio

nal -

ist?

Pie

t

PS

: The

mo

st s

pec

ific

elem

ent

of

De

Mee

rpaa

l is

the

op

en a

ir

thea

tre

of

cour

se. I

t w

as d

one

in

such

a w

ay t

hat

qui

te d

iffer

ent

kind

of

spat

ial a

rran

gem

ents

w

ere

po

ssib

le (

van

Klin

gere

n w

as r

athe

r in

volv

ed in

the

atre

re

new

al o

f hi

s tim

e). A

long

its

bo

rder

s, a

men

ities

like

a c

raft

ro

om

, sm

all e

xpo

hal

l, an

d c

af

(with

ter

race

insi

de,

no

t o

utsi

de)

w

ere

situ

ated

. Van

Klin

gere

n th

oug

ht o

f D

e M

eerp

aal a

s a

cov -

ered

sq

uare

. Per

hap

s it

is u

rban

d

esig

n in

the

gui

se o

f ar

chite

c -tu

re. D

esig

n is

all

ove

r th

e p

lace

, b

ut

diff

eren

t fr

om

the

str

uc-

tura

lists

t

here

was

no

att

emp

t to

cre

ate

spat

ial c

om

ple

xity

; on

the

cont

rary

, Van

Klin

gere

n w

as

focu

sing

on

(the

po

ssib

ilitie

s fo

r)

pro

gram

mat

ic c

om

ple

xity

with

a

min

imum

of

spat

ial m

eans

.Th

at is

the

big

diff

eren

ce, I

thi

nk.

The

idea

tha

t a

com

ple

x so

cial

st

ruct

ure

is b

est

serv

ed b

y a

com

ple

x sp

atia

l sch

eme

is o

ne o

f th

e m

isco

ncep

tions

of

stru

ctur

-al

ism

. O

n 0

2 O

ct 2

014

, at

13:5

4,

Dir

k va

n d

en H

euve

l wro

te:

In s

om

e is

sues

of

Foru

m

trad

itio

nal D

utch

vill

ages

are

re

fere

nced

, but

no

t m

any.

Joo

p v

an S

tigts

arc

hive

I sa

w a

st

udy

of

a p

old

er v

illag

e

that

is

res

pec

ted

and

just

out

sid

e its

bo

rder

s a

new

ana

loge

ous

st

ruct

ure

is e

rect

ed

so

me

-w

hat

like

Can

dili

s, J

osi

c an

d W

oo

ds

str

ateg

y fo

r To

ulo

use

le M

irai

l B

akem

as

des

ign

for

Ken

nerm

erla

nd is

co

mp

arab

le a

s st

rate

gy

res

pec

t fo

r th

e ho

rizo

n an

d s

om

e ch

urch

to

wer

s an

d s

till

mo

der

nize

with

out

rem

ors

e.

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 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 project is both anecdotal, metaphoric and structural. It creates its own 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.



architect / author

architect / author




P. Blom 1978

Van den Broek en Bakema 1980

Co

mm

unity

cent

er D

e S

chal

m.

Act

ual d

evel

op

men

t

2120

Pie

t B

lom

was

to

tally

wild

of

his

ow

n ne

ighb

orh

oo

d D

e Jo

rdaa

n in

A

mst

erd

am o

f co

urse

; per

hap

s he

was

the

firs

t to

use

loca

l w

ork

ing-

clas

s ne

ighb

orh

oo

ds

as

insp

irat

ion?

D.

On

02

Oct

201

4, a

t 22

:03,

A

rjen

Oo

ster

man

wro

te:

Hi D

irk,

Th

e la

ngua

ge/u

se d

istin

ctio

n is

fas

cina

ting.

Co

rrec

t m

e if

Im w

rong

, but

str

uctu

ralis

m

as la

ngua

ge (

lets

ass

ume

that

ex

ists

) w

as d

evel

op

ed t

o c

oun

ter

a si

tuat

ion

for

whi

ch t

he e

xist

ing

lang

uage

was

inad

equa

te. L

an-

guag

e as

co

nseq

uenc

e, n

ot

as

goal

. Suc

h a

lang

uage

tak

es o

n a

life

of

its o

wn,

intr

od

uces

its

ow

n d

ynam

ics.

And

nex

t yo

u ha

ve

rhet

ori

c. I

agre

e w

ith P

iet

that

st

ruct

ural

ism

is m

ore

the

imag

e o

f fle

xib

ility

and

fre

edo

m o

ver

time,

tha

n th

e ac

tual

ach

ieve

-m

ent

of

that

idea

l and

tha

t a

bui

ldin

g lik

e D

e M

eerp

aal s

eem

s th

e m

ore

eff

ectiv

e an

swer

. A

rjen

On

03

Oct

201

4, a

t 00

:07,

P

iet V

olla

ard

wro

te:

Arj

en, t

hank

s fo

r yo

ur c

onc

ise

sum

mar

y t

hat

stru

ctur

alis

m

is m

ore

the

imag

e o

f fle

xib

ility

an

d f

reed

om

ove

r tim

e, t

han

the

actu

al a

chie

vem

ent

of

that

idea

l an

d t

hat

a b

uild

ing

like

De

Mee

r -p

aal s

eem

s th

e m

ore

eff

ectiv

e an

swer

. D

one

with

tha

t p

art

of

our

dis

cuss

ion?

In la

st w

eek

s sa

lon,

Han

s va

n D

ijk r

efer

red

to

che

ss a

s an

oth

er

in m

etap

hor,

in r

eact

ion

to

Her

tzb

erge

rs o

ften

use

d g

ame

and

fiel

d c

om

par

iso

n; a

rchi

tec -

ture

cre

ates

the

pla

ying

fiel

d, t

he

user

s p

lay

the

gam

e, a

nd t

hat

pla

ying

is c

alle

d a

pp

rop

riat

ion.

In H

ans

van

Dijk

s w

ord

s: H

ertz

-b

erge

r p

rovi

des

a c

hess

bo

ard

and

rul

e se

t w

here

van

Eyc

k cr

eate

s a

mag

nific

ent

po

sitio

n o

n th

e ch

essb

oar

d (

chec

kmat

e in

sev

en m

ove

s). A

s o

ften

, th

e m

etap

hor

pro

duc

es s

om

e un

exp

ecte

d in

sigh

t (p

artic

ular

ly

on

Van

Eyc

k), b

ut a

t th

e sa

me

time

it p

rod

uces

all

kind

s o

f q

uest

ions

. The

firs

t b

eing

: do

the

p

laye

rs/u

sers

kno

w t

he r

ules

of

the

gam

e? In

oth

er w

ord

s: d

o un

iver

sal s

oci

al r

ules

/str

uctu

res

real

ly e

xist

, as

(no

n-ar

chite

c -to

nic)

str

uctu

ralis

m c

laim

s? R

ules

th

at d

on

t ha

ve t

o b

e ta

ught

. If

so, I

wo

uld

love

to

kno

w, a

nd

I wo

uld

als

o h

ave

liked

to

be

hars

hly

exam

ined

on

thes

e ru

les

dur

ing

my

arch

itect

ure

stud

ies,

in

clud

ing

the

next

exa

m o

n ho

w

to t

rans

late

the

se s

truc

ture

s sp

a -tia

lly. I

do

nt

reca

ll H

ertz

ber

ger

givi

ng s

uch

an e

xam

inat

ion

(I

was

a s

tud

ent

at T

U D

elft

whe

n H

ertz

ber

ger

was

tea

chin

g th

ere)

. In

fac

t, hi

s o

ften

use

d p

hoto

of

two

peo

ple

sea

ted

at

a ta

ble

in

the

tin

y sp

ace

bet

wee

n tw

o p

arke

d c

ars

real

ly s

how

s th

at

any

pla

ying

fiel

d, e

ven

the

mo

st

unlik

ely

one

, can

enc

our

age

pla

y.

It is

my

hunc

h th

at t

he s

truc

tur -

alis

ts (

the

arch

itect

s th

is t

ime)

d

idn

t kn

ow

the

se u

nive

rsal

rul

es/

stru

ctur

es e

ither

, tha

t th

ey o

nly

intu

itive

ly g

uess

ed t

hey

exis

ted

. Th

e fie

ld m

ay h

ave

ther

e, b

ut t

he

rule

s w

ere

not

clea

r an

d u

nive

r -sa

l. V

an E

yck

may

hav

e cr

eate

d a

stro

ng p

osi

tion

on

the

ches

s -b

oar

d, b

ut h

e w

asn

t in

tere

sted

ho

w t

o r

each

che

ckm

ate

in

seve

n m

ove

s.C

om

par

e so

meo

ne li

ke G

uy

Deb

ord

, who

des

igne

d a

bea

u -tif

ul c

hess

-lik

e se

t fo

r hi

mse

lf w

ith s

uch

com

plic

ated

rul

es t

hat

onl

y he

kne

w h

ow

to

pla

y th

e ga

me.

Or

Mar

cel D

ucha

mp

who

ad

just

ed t

he r

ules

of

the

gam

e at

will

onc

e in

aw

hile

, if

Im n

ot

mis

take

n.

Des

igne

rs t

end

to

fo

rget

tha

t to

p

lay

free

ly c

om

es w

ith d

evel

-o

pin

g ru

les

(and

ad

just

ing

them

) w

hile

pla

ying

. Deb

ord

an

d D

ucha

mp

did

so

pla

ying

on

thei

r o

wn,

and

tha

t is

per

mitt

ed,

but

as

arch

itect

yo

u o

ffer

the

ga

me

to o

ther

s (a

nd y

ou

re n

ot

pre

sent

whe

n p

eop

le a

re a

ctua

lly

pla

ying

).

In D

even

ter,

Her

tzb

erge

r p

ro-

vid

ed a

fiel

d a

nd s

om

e ru

les,

b

ut h

e w

as d

isap

po

inte

d b

y th

e ga

me

that

dev

elo

ped

a

fai

lure

. P

erha

ps

like

Van

Eyc

k, h

e sh

oul

d ha

ve c

reat

ed a

str

ong

po

sitio

n o

n th

e ch

essb

oar

d h

imse

lf ;-

).

That

s w

hat

he d

id in

his

late

r w

ork

. The

ris

k b

eing

tha

t th

e ga

me

is d

irect

ed t

o r

igid

ly, a

p

red

efine

d p

lay,

in w

hich

the

fr

eed

om

to

cha

nge

the

rule

s is

lo

st. I

m e

xagg

erat

ing,

of

cour

se.

Or

am I?

Pie

t


objectnummer /inventarisnummer year objectnummer /inventarisnummer year

objectnummer /inventarisnummer yearobjectnummer /inventarisnummer year

architect / author architect / author

architect / authorarchitect / author




P. Blom 1978 P. Blom 1978

22 23

Piet Blom: from Kasbahism to structureFrancis Strauven

The address, found in the Blom archive, that was delivered at the opening of the Structuur exhi-bition on 18 September 1965 at the Academy of Architecture in Amsterdam, is one of the few texts produced by Blom dating from that time. Although, on first reading, it seems rather erratic, somewhat rash, when carefully re-read the text proves to reveal much about Bloms position at the time, and about the infancy of the movement that become known successively as kasbahism, configurative discipline and structuralism. In his address, held when he was a 30-year lecturer and had been project-leader for a year, Blom, for all his insouciance, made a self-assured impression. As an undergraduate at the Academy, he had emerged as a gifted, brilliant designer. In September 1959, Aldo van Eyck had presented Bloms study project The Cities will be Inhabited like Villages in Forum review as the outcome of the story of another idea. And at the CIAM congress in Otterlo, that project also featured alongside the plan of the Amsterdam orphanage, linked to it by the slogan vers une casbah organ-ise. Blom had continued working in the same vein, and had christened his design approach kasbahism. In 1962 Van Eyck, who recognized Bloms study designs as a continuation of his own thinking, had developed a theory to explain and substantiate the new design method in the steps towards a configurative discipline, a pivotal article in which he did not fail to expose Bloms achieve-ments. Admittedly, this propitious development was brazenly frustrated by the Smithsons, who, at the Team 10 meeting in Royaumont, had labelled Bloms Noahs Ark a form of fascism. Their odious condemnation caused Van Eyck to have misgiv-ings and temporarily spurn configurative design. However, his students continued the develop-ment. In 196263 Herman Hertzberger, in his

capacity of lecturer at the academy, had set up a study of configuration a project in which the configurative approach was elaborated into a step-by-step method. Blom, who was appointed as a lecturer a year later, had also directed a configurative pro-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 or the configurative principle. It looks as if he wanted to distance himself from Van Eyck and the whole story of configuration, which Team 10 had rejected, and that he, as the acknowledged initia-tor of Kasbahism, wished to continue developing that movement in his own way.He advanced the term structure as a canopy covering the exhibited plans. He did not go into the geometrical or thematic composition of that structure, but focused mainly on its mediating role between social regulation and the aspira-tions of contemporary society. The ordering and regulating character of the present day forms the base of the building brief and requires an ordered structure of the built environment. But it is the architects job to interpret that structure in such a way that it provides maximum freedom for developing life. Just as regulated working hours generate leisure time, the ordered structure must open up space for the great diversity of unor-dered life. The structure he envisaged was to be the opposite of a sequence of self-contained buildings that kept activities separate. He wanted an open structure enabling various happenings to be experienced at the same time. In his opin-ion, society was in a state of mutation. Life was enriched with a vast quantity of industrially-pro-duced things: machines, appliances, gadgets and other stuff. They form a kind of second nature and turn the human being into a new kind of animal. The human being is no longer a person with a fixed identity. The centre of our individu-ality is at least situated outside ourselves. Man becomes a decentred animal living in the plural. Looking back over his development, Blom felt that Kasbahism had been a productive design method, but it no longer corresponded to the new 1965 attitude towards life. He felt the explicitness of the structure particular to the term kasbah was especially outdated. He switched his focus





architect / author

architect / author


P. Blom 1978


2524

to the infinitely complex and elastic society that would want only smother structures. A more vul-gar realism has gradually developed. Blom gave his address at the height of the Provo [Dutch counterculture] era, and he was concretizing the st

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