Press release Habitat: Expanding ArchitecturePress release Habitat: Expanding Architecture

Ecology is now a well-known concept in architecture and urban planning. The research installation Habitat: Expanding Architecture, on show from 19 October, highlights one of the first moments in which ecological thinking was introduced in architectural discussions: the tenth CIAM congress in Dubrovnik, 1956.

Habitat was introduced as an alternative to the idea of the Functional City that CIAM had propagated since the 1930s. With 'habitat' they looked for a broader approach beyond functionalism, to do justice to local cultural identities and existing landscape and urban qualities. Architecture was no longer just about the production of shapes and objects, but also about processes of growth and change. Cities should no longer be regarded as separate collections of buildings, but as coherent, ecological systems.

The core of this exhibition is a reconstruction of the material that the CIAM members presented to each other in Dubrovnik 1956. Next to works by Jaap Bakema, Aldo van Eyck and Alison and Peter Smithson,  there are also works by artists such as James Stirling, Piero Bottoni, Arne Korsmo, Geir Grung, the Finnish group PTAH and the Portuguese CIAM Porto group.

The CIAM material from the 1950s has been supplemented with more recent work to illustrate how ecological and theoretical approaches to architecture have since been interpreted in different ways: the phenomenal studies on the relations between settlements and landscape formations of Pjotr Gonggrijp, the transformative interpretation of the Dutch delta landscape by Frits Palmboom, and the discussions surrounding the Tanthof district in Delft, designed by Van den Broek and Bakema together with the Tanthof working group. Some projects from the 1980s are also shown, such as the  Nieuw Nederland (New Netherlands) exhibition and the 'Tapijtmetropool' (‘Patchwork Metropolis’) research by Willem Jan Neutelings.

_Habitat: Expanding Architecture_ (19 October - 10 March) combines archive research with public presentations. Most of the material presented comes from Het Nieuwe Instituut's collection. The project incorporates an intensive programme of seminars and conversations with international guests, students, historians, architects and planners.

Pjotr Gonggrijp. Various types of landscape in the Netherlands delta region, 1969. Scale 1:100.000. Situation c.1550 and later. Lowest sheet shows landscape; top sheet shows settlement pattern and changed landscape (dune formation). Collection Het Nieuwe Instituut, GONG 3

For more information and images, please contact Petra van der Ree, p.vanderree@hetnieuweinstituut.nl