Collecting, Curating, Echoing

Kingston University London MA Curating Contemporary Design

Module: Theory of the Object

Essay title: Collecting, Curating, Echoing: From the Experimental Exhibition to the Experimental Production of Architecture

or How have museums challenged the ways architectural and curatorial discourse is undertaken?

Submitted by: Theodora Maria Pyrogianni K1336443 Submission date: 12/01/15

Tutors: Professor Catherine McDermott, Anthony Burton

C o l l e c t i n g, C u r at i n g, E ch o i n g : From the Experimental Exhibition to the Experimental Production of Architecture

by Theodora Maria Pyrogianni 

Introduction

The status quo of architecture exhibitions is that they are becoming motors of architectural theory and practice rather than standing still as mere reflectors. That said, an immediate enquiry emerges regarding the role of exhibitions and institutions in challenging the ways architectural theory and practice is undertaken. With that in mind, this essay considers architecture exhibitions as a tripartite act linking collecting, curating and echoing as a means for driving and stimulating architectural thinking and making.

Starting with the subject of experimental exhibitions and its implications this essay moves on to the experimental production of architecture through an analysis of a new museum typology - that emerges with the foundation of the Canadian Centre for Architecture, two case studies and their impact. As the controversy in exhibiting architecture nowadays is placed upon, roughly, the issues of ‘architecture in place and time’ and ‘architecture in process,’ concerns such as the old-time paradox of ‘displaying whilst displacing architecture’ are no longer prominent. Therefore, this essay deals with issues of contemporary architecture exhibitions and seeks to identify the trace of their affect through obscurity. An obscurity that someone can navigate through by associating this shift of focus in architecture exhibitions with the rise of a new typology of institutions devoted solely to architecture.

As architecture exhibitions turned from tools of advertising to apparatuses for thinking and making, similarly, the institutions turned from creators of fashions to promoters of scholarly research and to stimulators for debate. It is indeed a fact that cultural institutions have challenged the way architecture discourse in undertaken. Having said that, this essay takes that as a given and further aims at tracing how this has been achieved, while at the same time, also attempts to detect whether the activities of such institutions resonate from today’s perspective.

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part 1: In search of a term for the CCA

A mouseion for Architecture The idea of creating a museum of architecture is not a new concept, in fact, it has been in currency since the late 18th century.1 However, as many historians and critics proclaim, when it comes to architecture exhibitions it all starts with the Museum of Modern Art and the ‘Modern Architecture - International Exhibition’ show in 1932. Be that as it may, the truth is that nowadays the MoMA is not the leading force and has been surpassed in terms of exhibiting architecture by other institutions.

With the rise of a ‘new generation’ of architecture museums, centres and foundations, by the end of the 1970s, the curatorial field has been constantly shaping and architecture exhibitions have stepped into an experimentation phase ever since. Just to name a few of them: The Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA) in Montreal established in 1979; the Deutsches Architekturmuseum (DAM) in Frankfurt in 1979; the Institut Français d’Architecture (IFA) in Paris in 1981; the Swiss Architekturmuseum (SAM) in Basel in 1984; the Danish Architecture Centre (DAC) in Copenhagen in 1985; the Netherlands Architecture Institute (NAI) in Rotterdam in 1988; the Architecture Foundation (AF) in London in 1991; the Architectuzentrum in Vienna in 1993; and the A+D Architecture and Design museum in Los Angeles in 2001; all emerged after 1979, exactly after the International Confederation of Architectural Museums (ICAM) was founded.2

But, in what way is this ‘new generation’ of museums more evolved than those that predated the1970s? And is it possible to attribute one definition to this ‘new generation’ or typology of museums that can encompass their meaning and scope? What fundamentally changed in the way architecture museums operate, is that collecting, researching, producing discourses, and providing platforms for debate have been their principal activities in contrast to those existing prior to 1979.

Curating and publishing being the common ground between them, always central in their scope as a way for ideas to resonate through time.

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part 1: In search of a term for the CCA

In an attempt to define this novel museum typology that deals with so many pedagogic aspects, one would have to inquire the origins of the word ‘museum.’ The pre 19th century meaning of the word itself – deriving from the Greek term ‘mouseion,’ meaning ‘realm of the Muses’ – “was applied in ancient Greece to places where philosophers gathered to debate…”3 In a similar manner, the scope of contemporary architecture museums relies in the formation of new discourses through debate and exchange of ideas and concepts. At the same time, it retains its original meaning of a place, a collection and a pursuit of systematically generating and disseminating knowledge.

In 1979 the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA), a mouseion devoted entirely to architecture, was born out of the collection of the architect and philanthropist Phyllis Lambert4 [figure 1] - an influential and celebrated figure in architecture today for her contribution in the fields of research and curating.

For exactly 10 years after its foundation, the CCA5 was slowly taking shape with its collections at the core of the institution. It is only in 1989 that the institution was physically integrated with the city thanks to a new museum building. The CCA was housed in an austere limestone building - which incorporated the preserved Shaugnessy House 6 that Lambert rescued from demolition - that was designed by the Canadian architect Peter Rose [figures 2, 3, 4].

As the director and trustees of the museum proclaim on the museum’s website: “the CCA is a leading voice in advancing knowledge, promoting public understanding, and widening thought and debate on architecture, its history, theory, practice, and role in society today.”7 As a museum of such a complex role, the CCA has engaged, over the years, with a diverse audience, from scholars and practitioners to the lay public. Aiming at revealing the potential of architectural and urban culture and to stimulate dynamic engagement with contemporary issues and debates their public programme is both local and international in scope.8

For Lambert it all begun out of curiosity: “…I was interested in how architects thought at different periods, what kind of buildings they did, and how different architects presented ideas and solved 4

part 1: In search of a term for the CCA

problems.”9 With curiosity being an aspect of thought that stems from preference, her collection included a variety of examples that demonstrate the diverse ways in which architecture has been imagined, conceived, observed, and transformed. Examples that allowed further scrutinising of the relationships among ideas, the evolution of tendencies and movements, diverse theoretical and practical approaches, and new architectural and urban forms.10

So, unlike in other museums and institutions, at the CCA collecting was prior to the idea of doing exhibitions.11 As a museum, writes Helen Searing in 1989 on the occasion of the museum’s inauguration, “it is inextricably dependent on its other functions such as its collections, archives, conference and study centre.”12 This led to themes in research that were overseen by an ever-expanding collection that includes international publications and architectural design documentation - conceptual studies, drawings, plans, models, prints, and master photographs, archives and oral histories of individual architects, related artefacts and ephemera.13

By considering the prominence of this vast collection, one can only begin to valorise the CCA as a ‘mouseion’ in the contemporary world of architecture. However, it is merely through exhibiting that the CCA escaped the stagnancy and limitations of the pre 19th century ‘mouseion.’ Through its exhibitions and publications the CCA has placed itself at the centre of a global debate about redefining architecture today, something that recent historiography has not been able to define yet. Thus, to a great extend the CCA has challenged profoundly the way architectural discourse is undertaken in academia and practice. Via its critical exhibitions the CCA has greatly contributed to promoting the history and theories of architecture and to shaping the curatorial field in the discipline.

Cities of Artificial Excavation and Archaeology of the Mind, both exhibitions hosted by the CCA, will become the objects under scrutiny in this essay, as they testify that exhibitions have overcome many limitations and have come close to reaching their potential. In addition to that, these two exhibitions can be considered as two remarkable examples through which it is possible to trace the echo of the curatorial practice of the CCA in other academic institutions and practices.

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figure 1. Phyllis Lambert, 1959, during her studies at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), Chicago. Photographer: Ed Duckett. Phyllis Lambert Fonds, Collection CCA, MontrĂŠal.

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figure 2. Naoya Hatakeyama. View of the Visitors’ Courtyard, Canadian Centre for Architecture, MontrÊal.

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figure 3. Plan of the CCA.

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Trajet vers le jardin du CCA Pathway to the CCA garden

The new building resembles an E, with Shaughnessy House serving as the centre bar. The main entrance, Toilettes in the long, north-facing facade that forms the straight edge of the E, opens into a grand Washroom stair hall that leads Téléphone to the public spaces located on the first floor: exhibition galleries, bookstore, and library. At ground level are Phone curatorial offices, and below are two floors of vaults.

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figure 4. Robert Burley. View of the Esplanade and the Allegorical Columns, Canadian Centre for Architecture Garden, MontrĂŠal, 1990.

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part 2: From objects to spaces and back to objects again…

Cities of Artificial Excavation The Work of Peter Eisenman, 1978-1988 2 March to 19 June 1994, Main Galleries, CCA

“Cities of Artificial Excavation is about invention in architecture… Eisenman’s invention is to free architecture of its own traditional language and canons. In Cities of Artificial Excavation he searches, as he must, beyond the modernists’ predominating interest in material-generated form, for form generated by the critical reading of key texts. He uses these as a point of departure for excavating, abstracting, and reassembling the particularities of site.”14

Phyllis Lambert

Cities of Artificial Excavation: The Work of Peter Eisenman, 1978-1988 explores the concept of site as a means of generating architectural form in four projects of the American architect and theorist.

The exhibition demonstrates how Eisenman’s investigation of site became the main approach for his proposals, built work, and ongoing criticism of the discipline of architecture. The displayed projects, proposed or realised between 1978-1988, are represented through drawings and models in a setting that the architect himself designed especially for this occasion.

The exhibition reveals the complexity of a design process that stems from Eisenman’s theoretical reflections for the following projects: the submission for the International Design Seminar in Cannaregio, Venice (1978)[figure 5]; the submission to the South Friedrichstadt housing competition of the Internationale Bauausstellung, Berlin (1980-81)[figure 6]; the project for the University Art Museum for California State University in Long Beach (1986)[figure 7]; and the Chora L Works, a garden for the Parc de La Villette in Paris (1985-1986)[figure 8].

Eisenman’s theoretical reflections on the particularities of the ‘site’ are ingeniously inscribed in the phrase Cities of Artificial Excavation, that the curator Jean-François Bédard devised. As Bédard asserts, the title embraces three main ideas: “the relationship of architecture to the city; the 11

part 2: From objects to spaces and back to objects again…

elimination of the value attached to rational design processes; and the fictitious creation through texts and drawings of traces associated with the site.”15

However, it is the notion of ‘excavation’ that can allow more interpretations regarding Eisenman’s ideas. Rethinking the phrase in relation to the exhibition layout - designed as stated above by Eisenman himself – allows us to recognise the architect’s attempt at ‘displacing architecture’ through abstraction and by rejecting a modern composition[figure 9].16 Something that “remained in many people’s minds as an exceptional gesture.”17 Through the displacement and dislocations in the exhibition space, Eisenman attempts to reduce architecture to its basic elements and his own basic ideas; decomposition,18 the grid, axonometry,19 layering, superposition,20 and juxtaposition[figure 10, 11]. These ideas are repeated throughout the exhibition space as they are also inherent to the exhibited works. For instance, the use of axonometry - the distortion of the grid - does not only appear in the drawings displayed on walls but also emerges as a spatial concept and display technique [figure 12].

Eisenman’s display is pre-occupied with bringing out a certain level of juxtaposition in the display; creating an oscillation between the exhibition and its setting. The architect returned to a modern conception of using the gallery as a spatial experiment – an idea predominant in the 1920s, but also entered post-modern dialectics in his display. Eisenman, as an architect who reflected upon modernism’s legacy throughout his work, entered an intense dialog between Peter Rose’s neo-Beaux Arts postmodern setting and the installation he designed.

As Eisenman stated when asked by Alan Balfour on this rather deceiving reasoning: “I think the interest in the exhibition is not the subject matter of artificial excavation as it is in the nature of the working process and the control of the working process.”21 In every way, this exhibition is introvert and self-referential as it explains architectural thinking as an independent critical act. However, it is this introspection that allows us to understand the constant juxtapositions between the conformity regarding the tools of its presentation and the unconventional techniques that he primarily uses for its production, like texts, objects, art, installations, etc.

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part 2: From objects to spaces and back to objects again…

Archaeology of the Mind Herzog & de Meuron 23 October 2002 to 6 April 2003, Main Galleries, CCA

“We are not to fill the exhibition space in the usual manner and to adorn it with records of our architectonic work… People imagine that they can follow the process, from the sketch to the final, photographed work, but in reality nothing has really been understood, all that has happened is that records of an architectural reality have been added together.”22

Jacques Herzog

Archaeology of the Mind presents the postures and attitudes of Swiss architectural practice Herzog & de Meuron regarding the ways in which things come to be made.23 The exhibition includes everything that has informed the thinking of Herzog & de Meuron; study models, books, photographs, toys, fossils, Chinese scholars’ rocks, and significant works of contemporary art [figure 13, 14]. The latter include paintings by Gerhard Richter and Andy Warhol, photographs by Bernd and Hilla Becher, Thomas Ruff, and Jeff Wall, sculptures by Donald Judd, Robert Smithson, Joseph Beuys, and Alberto Giacometti, among others [figure 15, 16].24

The exhibition includes many of their working models – ranging from very small to enormous fullscale material models, which are critical to the Herzog & de Meuron’s design process [figure 17] and “loom over the installation like the monumental fragments in archaeological museums,” says Philip Ursprung, “helping to suggest a history of the architects’ work.” 25 In direct confrontation with these models are objects of ethnography, palaeontology, and art. Referencing a natural history, the exhibition encompasses historic photographs, toys, and commercial catalogues from the CCA Collection, fossils from the Musée du Séminaire de Sherbrooke, and entomological collections from the Université de Montréal. 26

On this occasion too, the title Archaeology of the Mind may be understood as an attempt to 13

part 2: From objects to spaces and back to objects again…

research the origins of creativity for understanding an evolved process of making.

As Philip Ursprung - curator of the exhibition – pronounces, the title Archaeology of the Mind aims at paraphrasing Lefebvre’s ‘regressive-progressive’ method. That being said, it is rather clear that the exhibition had its sights set firmly on the future by investigating aspects of the past and other processes less progressed [figure 18]. The present, says Ursprung, “always retrospectively affects the past and reveals new aspects, things that were hitherto incomprehensible, which then in turn affect the present and what is yet to come.”27

Archaeology of the Mind presents something radically different from other architecture exhibitions; a symbiotic relationship or crossovers between art and architecture; and associations between seemingly disparate objects in species and origin. This rather interdisciplinary exhibition curved a new role for the curator Philip Ursprung who in this occasion dealt with architecture as a process and not a complete work. “We imagined,” says Ursprung, that “we were archaeologists from the future who came across hundreds of models in the architects’ archive without knowing what they meant. So we arranged the models according to formal and morphological criteria. We set them out so as to suggest links. We set them in the context of works of art, craft objects, ethnology, books, photographs, toys, and other things.”28

The idea of creating an exhibition concept as unique as this one results from the architects’ way of understanding and producing architecture [figure 19]. In other words, the core idea behind this display is to focus on ‘process’ rather than on ‘buildings.’29 It also stems from the belief of Jacques Herzog that he is forever compelled to find substitutes for exhibiting architecture. However, it is Ursprung who decided that the exhibits would be organised in the manner they were without panels of text on the walls, no pointers to existing buildings, no documentary photographs, no client’s models, and no plans.30

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part 2: From objects to spaces and back to objects again…

Blurring the distinction between reality and representation Via the two exhibitions, presented in this essay, the CCA entered a phase of experimentation regarding the limitations and opportunities associated with its museological role. The two topics that both these exhibitions touched upon: ‘architecture in place and time’ and ‘architecture in process,’ capture exactly what contemporary architecture exhibitions are about. Thus, putting an end to the concerns posed by the major controversy 31 of architecture exhibitions; the constraints of the physical absence of the work itself in the museum space. Consequently, accepting that an exhibition aims to comment on architectural ideas, their relationship to the world around them, and the formation of thought through the project.32

“Architecture, as distinct from building, is an interpretative, critical act. It has a linguistic condition different from the practical one of building.”33

Beatriz Colomina

Architecture, as distinct from its material state, is about showing critically the distinctive nature and features of the built and the imaginary space. It is mainly through the medium of exhibitions that curators and architects have made up the conceptual devices that can allow a reconstruction of space to take place in the mind. This is what curating architecture has evolved to, a sort of caretaking, explains Eve Blau, that allows “display and interpretation, in which architecture is both subject and object, curator and exhibit.”34

Contemporary architecture exhibitions are not concerned any longer with “objects in the built environment,” but, “with constituting a body of knowledge, a set of practices, a way of thinking and operating in the world.”35 Therefore, the focus of exhibitions has shifted from displaying finished artefacts to incomplete processes, from built work to thought, from the materiality of the building to its conception and critical reflection. In other words, an exhibition can either be an experiment itself or raise issues about the potentiality of experimental production. Something that curators oscillate 15

part 2: From objects to spaces and back to objects again‌

in between. Only to emphasise that the museum space becomes again a printed page – like a brief, and a place for thinking and studio for production.

figure 5. Eisenman Architects.

Sectional model of el structure, 1978.

figure 6. Peter Eisenman, Sketch axonometric showing existing buildings and proposed infills, 1980.

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figure 7. Office of Eisenman/ Robertson Architects, Presentation Model for University Art Museum, phase 4, California State University at Long Beach, 1986.

figure 8. Office of Eisenman/Robertson Architects, Presentation model of first scheme, 1986.

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figure 9. Eisenman Architects, ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, CCA, 1994. Installation of Peter Eisenman.

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figure 10. Eisenman Architects, ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, CCA, 1994.

Installation of Peter Eisenman.

Axonometry and superposition.

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figure 11. Eisenman Architects, ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, CCA, 1994.

Installation of Peter Eisenman.

Juxtaposition.

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figure 12. Diagram depicting the games of superposition and use of axonometry.

The model is placed against the wall on the vertical axis with an angle of 45째, implying axonometry as a spatial concept.

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figure 13. Gabion with Stones (local American Canyon).

The process of collecting and organising materials has been at the heart of Herzog & de Meuron’s work since their breakthrough project for the Ricola Storage Building and it continues in such projects as the Dominus Winery (1996-98), with its caged stones. figure 14. Dominus Winery, Yountville, California, 1995-98.

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figure 15. Gerard Richter I.S.A. (555) 1984. Oil on canvas, 250 x 250 cm, Bayer Corporation Collection, Pittsburg.

figure 16. Herzog & de Meuron, Laban Dance Centre, London (1997-2002)

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figure 17. Herzog & de Meuron, ‘Archaeology of the Mind’, CCA, 2002-2003. Installation by Herzong & de Meuron.

The centrepiece of the exhibition was not the completed buildings, although those were exhibited; they were represented only as ‘references’. What the curator did, therefore, was to invert the usual relation of ‘norms’ and ‘context’ or ‘process’. What was presented in the galleries of the CCA were not representations of the finished buildings of the architects but rather their design process.

Léa-Catherine Szacka, ‘Exhibiting the Postmodern,’ pp. 81-82

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figure 18. Herzog & de Meuron, ‘Archaeology of the Mind’, CCA, 2002-2003. Installation by Herzong & de Meuron.

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figure 19. Herzog & de Meuron, ‘Archaeology of the Mind’, CCA, 2002-2003. Installation by Herzong & de Meuron.

The show was ‘acknowledging the importance of finding new ways to reveal the transformative process of architecture’. For that, Ursprung ‘collaborated with the architects themselves to establish a kind of imaginary museum within the CCA, where visitors may encounter an exhaustive display of materials from Herzog and de Meuron’s archive and from related collections.’

Léa-Catherine Szacka, ‘Exhibiting the Postmodern,’ pp. 81-82

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part 3: Raising the architectural dead

What’s left?

Despite the constraints of space and time an exhibition can strongly influence architectural discourse, states Mirko Zardini – the current director of the CCA.36 The question, however, is how?

Is what’s left [figure 20] from exhibitions enough for us today in order to critically access their impact and echo? The fragments that synthesise architecture exhibitions are most of the times physically dispersed in many different locations; meaning that without a comprehensive manual their associations are forever lost.

What’s left, though, in both of the two cases presented above, is an exhibition catalogue or, better yet, a book that accompanies the exhibition. The two, of course, are not the same thing; the book that accompanies the exhibition does not aim at recording the event as it happened in space, that’s what the exhibition catalogue is for. The book is autonomous, involves critical reflections and creates an expanded life span for the ideas posed during the exhibition, according to Ursprung.37 In there lies the ability to raise the architectural dead; in the reflections of critics, conversations, interviews and debates all recorded in the book.

Otherwise, the value of every exhibition is lessen by the distance that is eventually created by the natural passing of time. Their relevance to future discourses and concerns relies on how successfully all of them are captured in text, memorised in critiques and recorded through photography or film. Making a similar point in his latest book ‘Ways of Curating,’ Hans Ulrich Obrist refers to Doris Lessing’s novel ‘Mara and Dann’ in which she expresses her belief that “our entire culture is extremely fragile” – as it’s interpretation depends on such complex devices.38 This fragility of our culture, whether we are taking about art, architecture or any discipline, is what projected the need for an improved documentation of our interpretations.

Naturally, flipping through the pages of both books [figures 21, 22] that were published on the two separate occasions at the CCA, I was able to make some associations from today’s perspective with that past and partially trace their impact to-day.

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part 3: Raising the architectural dead

From the Experimental Exhibition…

Cities of Artificial Excavation presents no interest in material-generated form. In return, it celebrates form generated by the critical reading of key texts for creating a different sensorial experience in relation to place and time. The key point of departure for ‘excavating’ – as abstracting, and reassembling the particularities of site, becomes the main aspect of the installation, which then enters a dialogue with its post-modern setting. The experience created by the displace and dislocations of fragments and ideas, can only be understood as a sensorial one.

Empathy39 then is the concept that Eisenman employs in a similar manner that is explored 20 years later in a different context at the exhibition Sensing Spaces: Architecture Reimagined. In an attempt to point out the formal associations between the two, I will refer to the installation by Grafton Architects in which they investigated the concept of empathy while being in direct confrontation with the setting of the Royal Academy [figure 23]. part 3: Raising the architectural dead

…to the Experimental Production of Architecture

Touching upon the Warholian idea of the archive, Archaeology of the Mind presents how architecture can be imagined and produced through the act of collecting. Either as a vehicle for architectural thought or as a motor for making exhibitions, the archive can project new ideas on conceptualising architecture. Exhibitions like this, are in that sense pedagogic as they exhibit aspects of architectural production that relate to other practices, either artistic or not. They serve as a testing ground that can generate more experiments. They are also proof that theory – in this case an archaeology stemming from the mind, has an important place in production processes. Finally, they allow a certain understanding of an architectural culture that is comprised of many disciplines.

Although, it is difficult to trace its larger impact, as an exhibition concept ‘architecture in process’ 28

has become a recognised genre in architecture exhibitions. As a curatorial strategy it is evolving concurrently with the emerging notion of the formation of collections and archival research. Within the context of architecture exhibitions, archives and collections can also inform and participate in exploring ideas about a wider critical discourse. Something that museums like the CCA support and rely on. However, if the CCA is the innovator then there is definitely a possibility for this strategy to further expand. Something that would certainly bring non-academic institutions on the same level of influence as educational institutions.

figure 20. Eisenman Architects, ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, CCA, 1994. Pile of debris at the close of the installation.

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figure 21. ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, exhibition catalogue, cover, 1994. figure 22. ‘Natural History’, exhibition catalogue of ‘Archaeology of the Mind’, cover, 2002.

figure 23. Installation by Grafton Architects at the Royal Academy of Arts for ‘Sensing Spaces: Architecture Reimagined’, 2014.

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Conclusion

Echoing Making a collection is a method of producing knowledge. When it comes to architecture though, it is not only knowledge that can be produced but also inspiration. As Hans Ulrich Obrist asserts, “to make a collection is a way of thinking about the world”; the postures and attitudes that lead someone to collect presume a certain level of assumption, juxtaposition, and openness to possibilities.40

Curating an architectural collection presupposes, on the other hand, a certain level of interpretation and association between the objects. An exhibition, as Mirko Zardini puts it, “is a reading of the world through architecture.”41 The very idea of an exhibition is that it can recreate ideas and communicate by bringing into proximity objects seemingly different, unknown or missing; a mise en scène for architectural thinking and making. Curating and exhibiting architecture though must be also thought as a critical act, recognising that placing it in a museum context will inevitably charge it with a new discourse.

A discourse that can only take place by gathering voices. It is no wonder that architecture exhibitions have run the gamut from accumulating and displaying dead objects to gathering people, practitioners, and relations [figure 24].42 Returning to the ancient meaning of the ‘mouseion,’ this time the ‘realm of the Muses’ is the place where architects, curators, artists, researchers and the public gather to debate.

However, it is equally important to stimulate a debate and an echo as it is to formally establish a new genre of display. As both architecture and he curatorial field are constantly shaping as archives, research, museums and their caretakers are evolving along with it. We need to keep asking how architectural discourse is affected through its exhibition and identify its implications.

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figure 24. from left to right: Peter Eisenman, Phyllis Lambert and Philip Johnson, CCA, 1994.

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Notes 1

Helen Searing, ‘The CCA as a museum of Architecture,’ p. 181.

2

Barry Bergdoll, ‘Out of Site, in Plain View: The Modernity of the Architecture Exhibition Since 1750’, part 6, lecture series 2011, [online] Available at: <https://soundcloud.com/nationalgalleryofart/the-sixtysecond-a-w-mellon-5>, [accessed 16 December 2014].

3

Nicholaus Pevsner, ‘A History of Building Types,’ p. 111

4

Phyllis Lambert, architect (b at Montréal 24 Jan 1927).

Educated at Vassar Coll (BA, 1948), Lambert embarked on her architectural career when she advised her father, distilling industrialist Samuel Bronfman, to choose Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, one of the most influential architects of the 20th century, to design the Seagram Building in New York.

Bronfman’s desire to create a significant architectural presence in New York and his almost unlimited budget blended well with Lambert’s strong will and drive for perfection. The result was widely regarded as a classic of modern architecture. After serving as director of planning (1954 to 1958) for this project, Lambert enrolled in the program Mies had established at the Illinois Institute of Technology. There she studied under Myron Goldsmith, receiving her MS Arch in 1963.

25 years after starting her prominent career in architecture, Lambert founded the CCA in 1979.

Since that time, Lambert has established herself as a leader in social issues of urban conservation and the role of architecture in the public realm. Recently, Lambert was awarded the 2014 Venice Biennale’s Golden Lion in recognition of a lifetime of work pushing the boundaries of architectural innovation.

Short biographical note on Phyllis Lambert, ‘the Canadian Encyclopedia’, [online] Available at: <http:// www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/phyllis-lambert/>, [accessed 22 December 2014], Short biographical note on Phyllis Lambert, ‘Jewish Women’s Archive’, [online] Available at: <http://jwa. org/encyclopedia/article/lambert-phyllis>, [accessed 22 December 2014].

Phyllis Lambert to Receive Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at Venice Biennale, ‘ArchDaily,’ [online] Available at: <http://www.archdaily.com/508501/phyllis-lambert-to-receive-golden-lion-for-lifetimeachievement-at-venice-biennale/>, [accessed 22 December 2014].

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To this day, the scope of the institution remains the same and is being achieved via several routes; by enhancing and promoting scholarly research in the field, and stimulating innovation in design practice. The CCA’s primary function was to collect and display architecture, as well as, to build public awareness of the role of architecture in society through their research and curatorial programme.

CCA Institutional Overview, [online] Available at: <http://www.cca.qc.ca/pages/Niveau2. asp?page=survol&lang=eng>, [accessed 20 December 2015].

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“Two wings embrace the restored Victorian mansion, the western one containing an auditorium and the eastern one an atrium housing offices and research areas for scholars. The rounded ends of the wings ac-

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knowledge the twin bay windows of the mansion as do the CCA’s rusticated base, classical detailing, and balanced composition. Modern, standardised aluminium elements form the cornice, which reinterprets the stone cornice of the old house and casts changing shadow patterns over the masonry walls.

Embracing modern and post-modern elements, the austere limestone building embodies long-standing interests of Lambert: the refined, classical modernism of her first mentor, Mies van der Rohe; Montréal’s old grey-stone architecture and property divisions; and repair of the urban fabric.”

Canadian Centre for Architecture, ‘the Canadian Encyclopedia,’ [online] Available at: <http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/canadian-centre-for-architecturecentre-canadien-darchitecture/>, [accessed 20 December 2014].

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CCA Institutional Overview, [online] Available at: <http://www.cca.qc.ca/pages/Niveau2. asp?page=survol&lang=eng>, [accessed 20 December 2015].

8

CCA Institutional Overview, [online] Available at: <http://www.cca.qc.ca/pages/Niveau2. asp?page=survol&lang=eng>, [accessed 20 December 2015].

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Citizen Lambert: Joan of Architecture (Canada-France, 2007), documentary film, written and directed by Teri Wehn-Damisch.

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CCA Permanent Collection, [online] Available at: <http://www.saatchigallery.com/museums/full-museum-details/permanent_collection/ac_id/849>, [accessed 20 December 2014].

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The MoMA had no collection for its first 15 years of existence and when in 1932 Philip Johnson had the idea of doing an architectural exhibition at the MoMA there were no architectural artefacts whatsoever in the museum’s collection. Other institutions such as the Venice Architecture Biennale, the Barbican Art Gallery or the Architecture Foundation in London don’t have collections and have to borrow artefacts or commission architects for new pieces for each exhibition that are afterwards completely dismantled. Léa-Catherine Szacka, ‘Exhibiting the Postmodern,’ p. 69.

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Helen Searing, ‘The CCA as a museum of Architecture,’ p. 181

13

CCA Institutional Overview, [online] Available at: < http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/collection/294-institutional-overview>, [accessed 20 December 2014].

14

Phyllis Lambert, ‘Director’s Note, Cities of Artificial Excavation,’ p. 7.

15

Jean- François Bédard, ‘Introduction, Cities of Artificial Excavation,’ p. 13.

16 Léa-Catherine Szacka, ‘Exhibiting the Postmodern,’ p. 79.

17 18

Léa-Catherine Szacka, ‘Exhibiting the Postmodern,’ p. 79.

“Decomposition…proposes a radically altered process of making from either modernism or classicism. By proposing a process which at root is the negative or inverse of classical composition, the process uncovers (or

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deconstructs) relationships inherent in a specific object and its structure which were previously hidden by a classical sensibility. Rather than working from an original type toward a predictable end, decomposition starts with a heuristic approximation of end, and end which is immanent within the new object/process. The result is another kind of object, one which contains a non-existent future as opposed to an irretrievable past. In one sense it is making by analysis, but not the traditional formal analysis.”

Eisenman, ‘The Futility of Objects: Decomposition and the Processes of Difference’, The Harvard Review 3 (winter 1984): 79.

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“In the nineteenth century axonometry was hailed by its modern inventors as a perfect tool for rendering the isomorphic nature of space and for advocating a standardisation of measurement. In the twentieth, the modern movement found in it the master code by which its dream of a universal space could be visualised.

All along it was viewed as a means of freeing the representation of space at last from the point of view of the subject.”

Yves-Alain Bois, ‘Surfaces, Cities of Artificial Excavation,’ p. 38.

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“My projects created what can be called superposition, which is a simultaneous existence of two or three formal and historical layers to produce another condition that is totally artificial – a hyper-condition, if you like, that has nothing to do with whatever was there, or could be there, but exists only in the juxtaposition.”

In conversation with Peter Eisenman, Cities of Artificial Excavation, p. 119.

21

‘In conversation with Peter Eisenman, Cities of Artificial Excavation,’ p. 124.

22

‘Conversation between Jacques Herzog and Bernhard Bürgi,’ Basel, 8th November 1990, [online] Available at: <http://www.herzogdemeuron.com/index/practice/writings/conversations/buergi-en.html>, [accessed 9 January 2015].

23

Nicholas Olsberg, ‘Preface (Dirctor’s Note), Herzog & de Meuron: Natural History,’ p. 8.

24

Herzog & de Meuron: Archaeology of the Mind, exhibition, [online] Available at: <http://www.cca. qc.ca/en/exhibitions/19-herzog-de-meuron-archaeology-of-the-mind>, [accessed 29 December 2014].

25

Herzog & de Meuron: Archaeology of the Mind, Press release, 22 October 2002, [online] Available at: <http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/19-herzog-de-meuron-archaeology-of-the-mind>, [accessed 29 December 2014].

26

Herzog & de Meuron: Archaeology of the Mind, exhibition, [online] Available at: <http://www.cca. qc.ca/en/exhibitions/19-herzog-de-meuron-archaeology-of-the-mind>, [accessed 29 December 2014].

27

Philip Ursprung, ‘Exhibiting Herzog & de Meuron, Herzog & de Meuron: Natural History,’ p. 39.

28

Philip Ursprung, ‘Exhibiting Herzog & de Meuron, Herzog & de Meuron: Natural History,’ p. 36.

29

Léa-Catherine Szacka, ‘Exhibiting the Postmodern,’ p. 82.

30

Philip Ursprung, ‘Exhibiting Herzog & de Meuron, Herzog & de Meuron: Natural History,’ p.38.

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31

When it comes to exhibiting architecture one faces the impossibility to displace the actual building. The traditional way to overcome that is to exhibit building fragments or to reproduce part of a building that exists or existed elsewhere. In the 18th and 19th centuries, museums such as the V&A in London and the Musée des Monuments Français in Paris contained mouldings and fragments, which, though also for the eyes of amateurs, were first and foremost for artists and craftsmen to copy or to seek inspiration from.” Mockups and casts of construction details provide the most immediate sense of actual size and texture but offer only a fragmentary glimpse of the building. The sensation of the interior spaces and the apprehension of the work’s larger milieu, are particularly difficult to convey. The other way of exhibiting architecture is to use representational tools – drawings, photographs, and models – to give an image of a building.

Léa-Catherine Szacka, ‘Exhibiting the Postmodern,’ p. 80.

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Mirko Zardini, ‘Exhibiting and Collecting Ideas: A Montreal Perspective,’ p. 81

33

Beatriz Colomina, ‘Architectureproduction,’ p. 7.

34

Eve Blau, ‘Curating Architecture with Architecture,’ p.24

35

Eve Blau, ‘Curating Architecture with Architecture,’ p.20

36

Mirko Zardini, ‘Exhibiting and Collecting Ideas: A Montreal Perspective,’ p. 80

37

The origins of the contemporary catalogue-book can be traced in 1960s marked with the folder of Documenta 5. Philip Ursprung, ‘The Indispensable Catalogue,’ p. 99 38

Hans Ulrich Obrist, ‘Ways of Curating,’ p. 47.

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Juhani Palalsmaa, in his book ‘The Embodied Image: Imagination and Imagery in Architecture,’ defines two imaginations; ‘projection of image’ and ‘simulation of an encounter.’ The first requires vision and the latter vision and empathy. The brain function required in visualisation and in experience of spaces is intrinsically related. There are different interpretations of this; that the empathy for simulation of an encounter is more challenging for the brain to achieve and subsequently the experiential nature of architecture is more omitted than design.

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Hans Ulrich Obrist, ‘Ways of Curating,’ p. 38.

41

Mirko Zardini, ‘Exhibiting and Collecting Ideas: A Montreal Perspective,’ p. 80

42

Tina Di Carlo, ‘Exhibitionism,’ p. 157.

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Bibliographical Appendix Colomina, Beatriz, (ed.), Architectureproduction, Revisions: Papers on Architectural Theory and Criticism (Revisions, volume 2) (New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 1988).

Szacka, Léa-Catherine, Exhibiting the Postmodern: Three Narratives for a history of the 1980 Venice Architecture Biennale (London: UCL, unpublished PhD thesis, 2010) Obrist, Hans-Ulrich, Ways of Curating (London: Faber & Faber, 2014)

Exhibition catalogues Cities of Artificial Excavation, ed. by Jean-François Bédard (Canadian Centre for Architecture and Rizzoli International Publications: 1994) Herzog & de Meuron: Natural History, ed. by Philip Ursprung (Canadian Centre for Architecture and Lars Müller Publishers: 2002)

Press releases Canadian Centre for Architecture to present Cities of Artificial Excavation: the work of Peter Eisenman,1978-1988, CCA, Montréal, 2 March 1994, [online] Available at:<http://www.cca. qc.ca/en/exhibitions/17-cities-of-artificial-excavation-the-work-of-peter-eisenman>, [accessed 29 December 2014].

Herzog & de Meuron: Archaeology of the Mind, CCA to exhibit ‘a chamber of wonders’ of the Pritzker prize-winning architects, CCA, Montréal, 22 October 2002, [online] Available at:<http:// www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/19-herzog-de-meuron-archaeology-of-the-mind>, [accessed 29 December 2014].

Articles in Journals Blau, Eve, “Curating Architecture with Architecture,” in Log, issue on ‘Curating Architecture,’ No.20 (Fall 2010), pp. 18-28.

Di Carlo, Tina, ‘Exhibitionism,’ in Log, issue on ‘Curating Architecture,’ No.20 (Fall 2010), pp. 15137

158.

Krauss, Rosalind E., ‘Le Musée sans murs du postmodernisme,’ in L’Oeuvre et son accrochage, special issue of Cahiers du Musée nationale d’art moderne, 17/18 (1986), pp. 152–8.

Lavin, Sylvia, “Showing Work,” in Log, issue on ‘Curating Architecture,’ No.20 (Fall 2010), pp.

5-10.

Searing, Helen, ‘The CCA as Museum of Architecture,’ in RACAR: Revue d’art Canadienne, Vol. 16 No. 2 (1989), pp. 181-192.

Ursprung, Philip, “The Indispensable Catalogue,” in Log, issue on ‘Curating Architecture,’ No.20 (Fall 2010), pp. 99-103.

Zardini, Mirko, “Exhibiting and Collecting Ideas: A Montreal Perspective,” in Log, issue on ‘Curating Architecture,’ No.20 (Fall 2010) pp. 77-84.

Films Citizen Lambert: Joan of Architecture (Canada-France, 2007), documentary film, written and directed by Teri Wehn-Damisch.

Podcasts Bergdoll, Barry, 2011 Slade lecture series at Cambridge University, ‘Out of Site, in Plain View: The Modernity of the Architecture Exhibition Since 1750’. [online] Available at:<https://soundcloud.com/nationalgalleryofart/the-sixty-second-a-w-mellon-5>, [accessed 16 December 2014].

‘The CCA in an expanding curatorial field’, 2010 Colloquium held at the CCA, organised by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/study-centre/1145-the-cca-in-an-expandingcuratorial-field>, [accessed 18 December 2014].

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Illustrations figure 1. Phyllis Lambert, 1959, during her studies at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), Chicago.

Photographer: Ed Duckett. Phyllis Lambert Fonds, Collection CCA, Montréal. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/cca-recommends/273-citizen-lambert-joan-of-architecture>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 2. Naoya Hatakeyama. View of the Visitors’ Courtyard, Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montréal. CCA Collection © Naoya Hatakeyama. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/ en/collection/336-cca-building>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 3. Plan of the CCA. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/visit>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 4. Robert Burley. View of the Esplanade and the Allegorical Columns, Canadian Centre for Architecture Garden, Montréal, 1990. CCA Collection © Robert Burley. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/collection/300-cca-garden>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 5. Eisenman Architects. Sectional model of el structure, 1978.

Cities of Artificial Excavation, p. 55 figure 6. Peter Eisenman, Sketch axonometric showing existing buildings and proposed infills, 1980.

Cities of Artificial Excavation, p. 89 figure 7. Office of Eisenman/Robertson Architects, Presentation Model for University Art Museum, phase 4, California State University at Long Beach, 1986. Cities of Artificial Excavation, p. 135 figure 8. Office of Eisenman/Robertson Architects, Presentation model of first scheme, 1986. Cities of Artificial Excavation, p. 189 figure 9. Eisenman Architects, ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, CCA, 1994. Installation of Peter Eisenman. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/17-cities-of-artificial-excavation-the-work-of- peter-eisenman>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 10. Eisenman Architects, ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, CCA, 1994. Installation of Peter Eisenman. Axonometry and superposition. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/ exhibitions/17-cities-of-artificial-excavation-the-work-of- peter-eisenman>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 11. Eisenman Architects, ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, CCA, 1994. Installation of Peter Eisenman. Juxtaposition. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/17-cities-ofartificial-excavation-the-work-of- peter-eisenman>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 12. Diagram depicting the games of superposition and use of axonometry. Sketch by the author.

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figure 13. Gabion with Stones (local American Canyon). Natural History, p. 197 figure 14. Dominus Winery, Yountville, California, 1995-98. Natural History, p. 197 figure 15. Gerard Richter I.S.A. (555) 1984. Oil on canvas, 250 x 250 cm, Bayer Corporation Collection, Pittsburg. Natural History, p. 358 figure 16. Herzog & de Meuron, Laban Dance Centre, London (1997-2002). Natural History, p. 358 figure 17. Herzog & de Meuron, ‘Archaeology of the Mind’, CCA, 2002-2003. Installation by Herzong & de Meuron. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/19-herzog-demeuron-archaeology-of-the-mind>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 18. Herzog & de Meuron, ‘Archaeology of the Mind’, CCA, 2002-2003. Installation by Herzong & de Meuron. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/19-herzog-demeuron-archaeology-of-the-mind>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 19. Herzog & de Meuron, ‘Archaeology of the Mind’, CCA, 2002-2003. Installation by Herzong & de Meuron. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/19-herzog-demeuron-archaeology-of-the-mind>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 20. Eisenmann Architects, ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, CCA, 1994. Pile of debris at the close of the installation. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/17-cities-of-artificial-excavation-thework-of- peter-eisenman>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 21. ‘Cities of Artificial Excavation’, exhibition catalogue, cover, 1994. [online] Available at:< http://www.gsd.harvard.edu/#/projects/cities-of-artificial-excavation-the-work-of-peter-eisenman-1978.html>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 22. ‘Natural History’, exhibition catalogue of ‘Archaeology of the Mind’, cover, 2002. [online] Available at:<http://www.lars-mueller-publishers.com/en/herzog-and-de-meuron-naturgeschichte-177>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 23. Installation by Grafton Architects at the Royal Academy of Arts for ‘Sensing Spaces: Architecture Reimagined’, 2014. [online] Available at:< https://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibition/4>, [accessed 8 January 2015]. figure 24. from left to right: Peter Eisenman, Phyllis Lambert and Philip Johnson, CCA, 1994. [online] Available at:<http://www.cca.qc.ca/en/exhibitions/17-cities-of-artificial-excavation-the-workof- peter-eisenman>, [accessed 8 January 2015].

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