In the Fall term of 2013, the Princeton School of Architecture will hold a series of lectures and public debates about the aesthetics of the Rarefied: what is the architecture that grows in a resource-depleted environment? Rarefied aims to capture an environment, an atmosphere of asphyxia which surrounds a practice driven by the lack of financial credit and natural resources. Which are the practices and the aesthetics that will succeed these decades of excess, and the architecture that results from them?
The Rarefied has a certain relation to the Miesian tradition, but without the essentialism, the neoclassicism or the material exuberance. It is anemic rather than minimal, and never white. It is neither modern, contemporary nor future; rather it is from the right now. It is related to the Povera lineage, but it is truly poor. It is gritty, rough, cheap, bare, precarious, and shared...often generic, automatic and anonymous. And it is generally built! The Rarefied is a candidate for a new architectural canon which explores a reduced material expression grounded in streetwiseness, economy, innovation and lack of self-indulgence.
The Rarefied sessions will be held at the Princeton School of Architecture in a round-table format where speakers will face the Princeton SoA Faculty and selected graduate students in a studio-like environment. The lectures will be streamed online for the general public. Sessions will take place on Wednesdays during the Fall term. Every session will be focused on a particular modality of the Rarefied.
Live Stream begins at 6 p.m. dates below
09/25 - Ephemeral
Markus Bader
Raumlabor, Berlin
10/2 - Rough
Simon Frommenwiler & Simon Hartmann
HHF Architects, Basel
10/9 - Automatic
Fabio Gramazio
Gramazio & Kohler, Zurich
10/16 - Ordinary
Andrés Jaque
Andrés Jaque Architects and Office For Political Innovation, Madrid
10/23 - Cheap
Santiago Cirugeda Parejo
Recetas Urbanas, Seville
11/6 - Shared
Indy Johar
00:/, London
11/13 - Raw
Jean-Philippe Vassal
Lacaton & Vassal Architects, Paris
11/20 - Generic
Kersten Geers & David Van Severen
Office KGDVS, Brussels
12/4 - Scarce
Alfredo Brillembourg & Hubert Klumpner
Urban-Think Tank, Zürich & New York City
All lectures take place at 6:00 PM in room N107, Architecture Building. For additional information please call 609-258-3741, e-mail soa@princeton.edu, or visit soa.princeton.edu. Lectures made possible by the Jean Labatut Memorial Lecture Fund. The School of Architecture, Princeton University, is registered with the AIA Continuing Education System (AIA/CES) and is committed to developing quality learning activities in accordance with the AIA/CES criteria.
Poster design by Phi Van Phan
