Fundamentals: Biennale Architettura 2014

View of San Marco/Doge’s Palace from the vaporetto

I’ve had the pleasure of visiting Venice for the second time within the past year for the 14th annual International Architecture Exhibition, curated by Rem Koolhaas, held from June 7 through November 23 at the Giardini and Arsenale venues in Venice. The theme of this year’s exhibition was “Fundamentals,” and according to Rem, it “looks at histories, tries to reconstruct how architecture finds itself in its current situation, and speculates on its future.”

The three interlocking exhibitions include:

French Pavilion, model from Mon Oncle (1958)

1) Absorbing Modernity: 1914-2014 (Giardini: National Pavilions), 65 national pavilions explore modernization and show “a radical splintering of modernities in a century where the homogenization process of globalization appeared to be the master narrative.”

Monditalia, Arsenale

2) Monditalia (Arsenale: Also, for the first time, Venice’s other biennales and festivals including dance, music, theatre and film collaborate with architecture), Italy is looked at as a “fundamental” country, combining 82 films, 41 architectural projects while merging architecture with dance, music and theatre. These exhibitions work to explore and form a “comprehensive portrait” of Italy. The architectural projects explore issues such as national borders, aspects of culture and geography.

3) Elements of Architecture (Giardini, Central Pavilion), the fundamentals of buildings (floor, wall, ceiling, roof, door, window, façade, balcony, corridor, fireplace, toilet, stairs, escalator, elevator and ramp) are all examined throughly. My favorite part of this exhibition was the movie titled “Elements” by Davide Rapp, that, reminiscent of Christian Marclay’s “The Clock,” use vignettes from films to compile sections dedicated to one specific element of architecture.