Learning from... Hong Kong
Self-built settlements on the roofs of high-rise buildings have been an integral part of Hong Kong’s history for over half a century. Rooftop structures range from basic shelters for the disadvantaged to intricate multi-storey constructions equipped with the amenities of modern life. Rufina Wu and Stefan Canham use the tools of an architect and a photographer to document(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theatre
3 May 2012 , 7pm
Learning from... Hong Kong
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Self-built settlements on the roofs of high-rise buildings have been an integral part of Hong Kong’s history for over half a century. Rooftop structures range from basic shelters for the disadvantaged to intricate multi-storey constructions equipped with the amenities of modern life. Rufina Wu and Stefan Canham use the tools of an architect and a photographer to document(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theatre
Learning from... Mumbai
Rahul Mehrotra presents a reading of Mumbai’s form as a symbol of India’s emerging urban culture. The lecture examines Mumbai, a megalopolis with more than 13 million inhabitants, as two distinct elements that occupy the same physical space. The first, the Static City, built of permanent materials like concrete, steel and brick, can be captured as a two-dimensional entity(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
9 April 2009
Learning from... Mumbai
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Rahul Mehrotra presents a reading of Mumbai’s form as a symbol of India’s emerging urban culture. The lecture examines Mumbai, a megalopolis with more than 13 million inhabitants, as two distinct elements that occupy the same physical space. The first, the Static City, built of permanent materials like concrete, steel and brick, can be captured as a two-dimensional entity(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
Learning from... Beirut
Hashim Sarkis, Aga Khan Professor at Harvard University and Director of the Aga Khan Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD), proposes an alternative reading of urban issues in Beirut that considers elements beyond the city’s post-war reconstruction and identity politics. Through a series of specific architectural and urban analyses, the lecture proposes(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
11 March 2010 , 7pm
Learning from... Beirut
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Hashim Sarkis, Aga Khan Professor at Harvard University and Director of the Aga Khan Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD), proposes an alternative reading of urban issues in Beirut that considers elements beyond the city’s post-war reconstruction and identity politics. Through a series of specific architectural and urban analyses, the lecture proposes(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
Learning from... Cairo
Nasser Rabbat challenges the traditional framing strategies of East vs. West or traditional vs. modern, focusing instead on the dialectical relationship of modernity and history in the making of contemporary Cairo. Shaped by distinct waves of modernity from the colonial Napoleonic invasion of 1789 to the revolution and independence in 1952, the city responded with layers(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theatre
15 September 2011 , 7pm
Learning from... Cairo
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Nasser Rabbat challenges the traditional framing strategies of East vs. West or traditional vs. modern, focusing instead on the dialectical relationship of modernity and history in the making of contemporary Cairo. Shaped by distinct waves of modernity from the colonial Napoleonic invasion of 1789 to the revolution and independence in 1952, the city responded with layers(...)
Paul-Desmarais Theatre
articles
Material Witness
The Lives of Documents, Photography as a Project, Stefano Graziani and Bas Princen, Susanne Kriemann, conversation, oral history, radioactive landscapes
11 March 2024
Learning from... Rome
Filmmaker and photographer Armin Linke reveals the societal changes, cultural complexities, and beauty of contemporary Rome through two short films and architectural photographs from his archives. The first film focuses on a moment of natural choreography as some 100,000 starlings fly against the backdrop of the city of Rome. Linke presents a selection of photographs,(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
5 March 2009
Learning from... Rome
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Filmmaker and photographer Armin Linke reveals the societal changes, cultural complexities, and beauty of contemporary Rome through two short films and architectural photographs from his archives. The first film focuses on a moment of natural choreography as some 100,000 starlings fly against the backdrop of the city of Rome. Linke presents a selection of photographs,(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
Disneyland, with its far-flung colonies in Florida, Japan, and France, is a key symbol of contemporary American culture that has been both celebrated and attacked as the ultimate embodiment of consumer society, of simulation and pastiche, of the blurring of distinctions between reality and mass-media imagery. The Architecture of Reassurance: Designing the Disney Theme(...)
Main galleries
17 June 1997 to 28 September 1997
The Architecture of Reassurance: Designing the Disney Theme Parks
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Disneyland, with its far-flung colonies in Florida, Japan, and France, is a key symbol of contemporary American culture that has been both celebrated and attacked as the ultimate embodiment of consumer society, of simulation and pastiche, of the blurring of distinctions between reality and mass-media imagery. The Architecture of Reassurance: Designing the Disney Theme(...)
Main galleries
events
Learning from... London
Kieran Long presents a story about the difficulty of describing a city in all its richness. London contains stories and meanings that are alive to its citizens, but apparently too difficult to talk about, too rich, and too messy to be allowed to affect those who decide how the city changes. The deafness of developers, politicians and architects to these narratives is so(...)
Paul Desmarais Theater
10 March 2011 , 7pm
Learning from... London
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Kieran Long presents a story about the difficulty of describing a city in all its richness. London contains stories and meanings that are alive to its citizens, but apparently too difficult to talk about, too rich, and too messy to be allowed to affect those who decide how the city changes. The deafness of developers, politicians and architects to these narratives is so(...)
events
10 March 2011
7pm
Paul Desmarais Theater
Architectural historian Barbara Penner traces the evolution of Niagara Falls – from its 19th-century honeymoon tourism to its state of post-industrial kitsch to its recent rebirth as a honeymoon destination. The photographer Alec Soth, whose work is the starting point for this lecture, compellingly portrays a ruined post-industrial landscape of love in his series Niagara(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
23 April 2009
Learning from... Niagara Falls
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Architectural historian Barbara Penner traces the evolution of Niagara Falls – from its 19th-century honeymoon tourism to its state of post-industrial kitsch to its recent rebirth as a honeymoon destination. The photographer Alec Soth, whose work is the starting point for this lecture, compellingly portrays a ruined post-industrial landscape of love in his series Niagara(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
Learning from... Brussels
Rotor members Michael Ghyoot and Maarten Gielen investigate the processes and practices of material management in Brussels and its suburbs. The concept of waste played a key role in their research and was informed by hundreds of visits to businesses, work sites, and recycling plants. The examination of discarded, unfinished products or those considered of inferior quality(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre
19 April 2012 , 7pm
Learning from... Brussels
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Rotor members Michael Ghyoot and Maarten Gielen investigate the processes and practices of material management in Brussels and its suburbs. The concept of waste played a key role in their research and was informed by hundreds of visits to businesses, work sites, and recycling plants. The examination of discarded, unfinished products or those considered of inferior quality(...)
Paul Desmarais Theatre