Why do we organise architecture exhibitions? Conventional shows – displaying documentation, technical drawings, three-dimensional models, photographs and videos where sketches and drawings are treated as if they were “paintings”, models as if they were “sculptures” and photographs idealise what they represent within strangely uninhabited landscapes – are contrasted by practices of display that put in their centre a different kind of investigation and spatial solutions that lend to the exhibition space a peculiar way of involving the public in the show.

The attitude that characterises the traditional approach to the architecture exhibition inevitably generates a distinction between the visitors that can read and interpret the displayed objects and those who cannot. Almost no empathy between the exposed objects and the subjects viewing them is generated; this kind of exhibitions often only try to solve the problem of presenting objects that cannot be transferred in the exhibitions spaces.
In the last years we assisted to the diffusion of exhibitions characterised by different approaches, i.e. shows in which architecture production is presented as an issue integrated in a broader critical context and assume then a central role from an unexpected point of view or exhibitions that concentrate on an emotional involvement of the visitor that is not confronted with a specific object and its characteristics, but with the transmission of an experience capable of establishing an intense relationship between the visitor and the content of the show.

In order to explore these issues, this conference brings together critical contributions related both to the conception and to the construction of the contemporary architecture exhibitions.

The contents
The subjects that are going to be investigated start from the criteria that animate a curator in the development of an architecture exhibition and extend to the relationships between the content of the exhibition and the instruments used for its display. What do we exhibit when we show architecture? Which are the aspects related to the built realm that are considered worth exhibiting and how can we organise the space in order to generate communication? Which is the surplus value offered from the architecture exhibition in the transmission of certain knowledge outside the distribution chain of the academic publications and journals? Is this kind of communication necessary?

The public
Regarding the visitors of an architecture exhibition the conference will deal with the question of who the public addressed by the show is. Can the definition of the contents of an exhibition, together with the adopted display techniques, influence who the public is going to be? Which are the relevant examples of architecture exhibitions that enact practices that distance them from the traditional form of the architecture show and provide a spatial involvement of the visitor and a personal relationship to the exhibited issues?

The devices
According to what said so far, the organisation of the space in the show will play a major role in the conference. Is the architecture exhibition just the presentation of surrogates of buildings that cannot be moved or is it something more? How is the space of an architecture exhibition arranged? Which are the physical devices that allow us to communicate about space through the construction of places? Drawings, sketches and three-dimensional models are internal devices of the discipline, which have been developed to visualise the design process and have established themselves as indispensable tools to the achievement (construction) of architecture. What further significance assume these devices in the context of the architecture show? Which role is played by further instruments like video and photography in the transmission of knowledge related to this kind of exhibition?

Inviting to this conference theorists, curators and professionals involved in the different phases of the exhibition design (including the critical evaluation of the role of the exhibition within the cultural, international panorama), we would like to give a contribution to the analysis of the contemporary practices of the architecture exhibition. The attention will be focussed on the ways an exhibition is able to display space, comment on an architecture idea and generate knowledge through the project.

Lecturer
Giovanna Borasi
Emanuela De Cecco
Tina di Carlo
Anne Holtrop
Kersten Geers
Wilfried Kühn
Andres Lepik
Carmelo Marabello
Ilka & Andreas Ruby
Something Fantastic

Contact
Arch. Eva Mair
Eva.Mair@unibz.it

Concept
Prof. Arch. Roberto Gigliotti
Faculty of Design and Art
Free University of Bozen Bolzano

In collaboration with the Architekturstiftung Südtirol – Fondazione Architettura Alto Adige

Registration
Admission is free of charge. Seat availability is limited.
Therefore please register by sending an email at Eva.Mair@unibz.it

Als der Studiengang Tourismus-, Sport- und Eventmanagement im Jahr 2007 von Dietenheim in den ehemaligen Amtssitz des Klosters Neustift in der Brunecker Stadtgasse übersiedelte, stand im historischen Gebäude kein Platz für eine Universitätsbibliothek zur Verfügung. Aufgrund dieses Platzmangels entschied sich die Universität gegen eine Ansiedlung der Bibliothek innerhalb des Universitätsgebäudes und für eine Kooperation mit der nahe gelegenen Stadtbibliothek Bruneck. Die Kooperation zwischen den zwei Institutionen war für beide gewinnbringend, das Platzproblem wurde jedoch in den letzten Jahren akut.
Im Juli kann die neue Stadt- und Universitätsbibliothek direkt neben dem Gebäude der Stadtgemeinde bezogen werden. „Die Bibliothek wird unseren Studenten ausreichend Lese- und Lernplätze mit Laptopanschlüssen bieten, Wireless LAN, sechs kleine Arbeitsräume für Studierende, einen Gruppenarbeitsraum und eine Terrasse zum Entspannen“, so die Leiterin der Universitätsbibliothek der Freien Universität Bozen Gerda Winkler. In Zahlen ausgedrückt bietet die neue Stadt- und Universitätsbibliothek auf rund 600 Quadratmetern Platz für 15.000 Medien.

Die Idee, Universitäts- und Stadtbibliothek unter ein Dach zu bringen, war bereits dem ehemaligen Verwaltungsdirektor des Universitätssitzes in Bruneck, Franz Grießmair, ein Anliegen, das von der Stadtgemeinde aufgegriffen und umgesetzt worden ist.
Besichtigt wurden die Räumlichkeiten am Donnerstag von den Mitgliedern des Fakultätsrates mit Dekanin Prof. Lucie Courteau, Studiengangsleiter Prof. Oswin Maurer, Studiengangskoordinator Hugo Götsch, der Bibliotheksleitung sowie Mitarbeitern des Sitzes Bruneck. „Der spezialisierte Bibliotheksbestand aus den Bereichen Tourismus, Sport- und Eventmanagement wird nicht nur unseren Studierenden zur Verfügung stehen, sondern auch den Bibliotheksbestand der Stadt Bruneck um ein wichtiges Thema bereichern“ so Dekanin Prof. Courteau.

(vic)