Burning Down The House
The 13th Venice Biennale
On this week's episode of Burning Down the House, Curtis B. Wayne is talking about this year's Venice Biennale, featuring direction from Sir David Chipperfield. Sir Chipperfield is best known for his restoration of the Neues Museum in Berlin after World War II. Hear how Curtis interprets Sir Chipperfield's inclusion in this year's Biennale, and what it means for architectural education and knowledge in the public sphere. Tune in to hear some audio clips of Sir Chipperfield discussing his architectural processes regarding materiality and context. Curtis also discusses the American offering at the Biennale- Spontaneous Interventions: Design Actions for the Common Good. Hear why Curtis finds the assumptions of the contribution to be problematic. Finally, learn about the social obligations of architecture, and why people outside of the field associate the profession with egotism. This program has been sponsored by Hearst Ranch.
"Over the last few years, there has been a long crisis of the quality of questions asked. And in the near past, architects and designers were asked to create objects and buildings solely with the aim of shocking a public that didn't know how to ask the right questions."
-- Curtis B. Wayne on Burning Down the House