Dutch revolution versus Danish evolution
DUTCH REVOLUTION VERSUS DANISH EVOLUTION The difference between the Superdutch and the Danish School Between the 1950’s and 1970’s the Danish Modern movement was famed all over the world. The precisely detailed designs made with natural materials of Jørn Utzon, Poul Kjærholm, Hans Wegner and Arne Jacobsen provided a combination of craftsmanship and modernism. Since then Danish architecture has for a long time been hanging on to this craftsmanship tradition and its importance has moved towards the background. This tradition is still clearly visible in the current work of some of the older Danish architectural firms, like Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects 1 and Henning Larsen Architects 2. In recent years architecture from the welfare state Denmark has once again come to the forefront of international architectural discourse. A whole group of young Danish architects create bold design proposals that are presented overly clear in their famous -almost childishly simplediagrams, their clean models chucked full of happy red scale persons and their epic but more or less generic renderings. The ‘’Danish school’’, as Shohei Shigematsu of OMA has labelled them 3, is headed by the now famous BIG but is followed by dozens of other firms carrying names like JDS, ADEPT, COBE, EFFEKT, SLETH and many more. In these fancy capital letters there already seems to be a clue towards the Dutch firms like OMA and MVRDV, commonly referred to as the Superdutch. This clue is not wholly unjustified taking in mind that the bold, conceptual and
diagrammatic design approach that is applied by the Danish is already clearly visible in the designs proposed by the Superdutch movement in the 1990s. Even so when asking any member of the Danish school if they are influenced by the Superdutch they would stoutly confirm. Leaving Winy Maas to state that the new Danish School is: ‘’Dutch Copy Paste – but sometimes better’’ 4. And the Danish to reply: ‘’Dutch Copy Paste – but (always) better’’ 5. Of course the relation between the Superdutch and the Danish School is not as simple as a mere ‘copy paste’. In this paper I will focus on the differences between the two movements and how these differences manifest themselves in the theoretical background that sustains the architecture. I would like to start with understanding where the metaphor of the ‘copy paste’ comes from in order to understand more clearly the influence the Superdutch have had on the Danish School. According to Joris Brorman, a specialist on contemporary Danish architecture, the adaption of the Danish to the Dutch architecture is not a coincidence. First of all Danish architecture was trapped in a sort of dead end at the turn of the century. Under the lasting influence of the craftsmanshipmodernism of the Danish Modern movement architecture was diminished to the so called ‘box game’ or ‘the perfection of the box’ 6. All major Danish architectural firms made highly detailed boxes in all kind of sizes that where almost too perfect, but ultimately quite dull. Under influence of the box game the
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Ahlmak, K., Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects lecture 28 november 2013, in DK@BK, Capita Selecta/TU Delft: Delft. 2 Kurek, J., Henning Larsen Architects lecture 21 november 2013, in DK@BK2013, Capita Selecta/TU Delft: Delft. 3 Weiss, K.L., A brief conversation with: Shohei Shigematsu OMA; New Danish School. Arkitektur dk, 2012. The pragmatic turn in Danish architecture of the 00's, Part 2(02 2012).
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Weiss, K.L., Copy paste but better - Winy Maas interview. Arkitektur dk, 2012. The pragmatic turn in Danish architecture of the 00's, Part 1(01 2012). 5 Jensen, J.B., Lecture 14 november 2013, in DK@BK2013, Capita Selecta/TU Delft: Delft. 6 ibid.
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