Find the Gap

An exhibition marking the 25th anniversary of Aedes A project supported by the German Federal Cultural Foundation

For a quarter of a century now, through its exhibitions and accompanying catalogs, the Aedes Architecture Forum in Berlin has stood for international and intercultural dialogue in architecture and urban planning. Founded in 1980 as the first private architectural institution worldwide, Aedes was and is committed to creating awareness of and stimulating interest in architectural and urban culture – not just among a professional audience, but among a wider public as well.

The spectrum of the approximately 300 exhibitions to date has ranged from the presentation of internationally renowned architectural enterprises to the discovery and promotion of younger talents and their experimental and visionary approaches. In this sense, the jubilee exhibition represents not merely a contribution to discussions of contemporary architecture; it revolves around a new architectural generation and its positions, its strategies, and its projects.

The jubilee exhibition is devoted to a rising generation of architects, those whose current ideas and visions will shape tomorrow’s urban environment. In the face of the often pessimistic perspectives on the future so prevalent in Germany today, the show presents the new organizational and operational forms of these younger architects. These forms are not restricted to the field of architecture alone, but are instead part of larger processes of social transformation. Rather than allowing themselves to be intimidated by the basic economic and social conditions, they reframe – through their manner of working and their projects alike – the tasks and functions of future architecture while redefining their own professional status. ‘Find the Gap’ emblematizes these strategies, based on a refusal to await large-scale projects, while instead exploiting preexisting ‘niches’ – which are spatial as well as contentual in nature – that permit the unfolding of creativity. The provocative projects by this architectural generation featured in the exhibition, the video film, and the accompanying catalog are as astonishing and inventive as they are relevant to the future. Their un-bureaucratic and arresting approaches not only actualize a new occupational image, but new ways of living and working as well.

Moreover, the exhibition demonstrates that architecture is not to be conceived exclusively in terms of constructive tasks, but instead as a vital component of cultural, social, political, and economic processes. Each of the 13 selected teams with 47 architects is presented at Aedes East by means of a forward-looking project. Through the manner of installation and in their interlinking with likeminded colleagues, the specific approach of each group is presented in a manner that is vivid, interactive, imaginative, and stimulating for a broad public. A video documentary will present the new office teams in unconventional interviews, offering perspectives of their working spaces, methods, and environments, explicating their ideas, and highlighting their social backgrounds. Alongside their projects, this film acquaints viewers with the new heads behind them.

The exhibition will be accompanied by an Aedes catalog in German and English, containing descriptions of the architects’ projects and introducing the contents of exhibition (text by Christopher Dell and Nikolaus Kuhnert).

Curators: Kristin Feireiss, Ulla Giesler Participants: Die Baupiloten | Susanne Hofmann, Berlin; bb22 urbane projekte | Melanie Bareuther, Friedemann Benrath, Aspasia Maheras, Felix Nowak, Sabine Sameith, Wolf Gunter Schlief, Jan Schulz, Martin Wilhelm, Frankfurt; Behles&Jochimsen, Berlin; complizen Planungsbüro | Andreas Haase, Tore Dobberstein, Halle; ForMade | Christiane Sauer, Berlin; KAROarchitekten | Antje Heuer, Bert Hafermalz, Stefan Rettich, Leipzig; mesh design - Duncan McCauley, Berlin; schoper.schoper Architekten, Dresden; spaces of uncertainty | Kenny Cupers & Markus Miessen Berlin, London, Boston; office for subversive architecture - osa | Sebastian Appl, Ulrich Beckefeld, Britta Eiermann, Karsten Huneck, Oliver Langbein, Anja Ohliger, Anke Strittmatter, Bernd Trümpler, Berlin | Köln | Frankfurt | Darmstadt | Wien | London; Team444 | Hermann Hiller, Peter Haimerl, Eik Kammerl, Markus Link, München; raumlabor_berlin | Francesco Apuzzo, Markus Bader, Benjamin Foerster-Baldenius, Martin Heberle, Jan Liesegang, Andrea Hofmann, Christof Mayer, Matthias Rick, Axel Timm, Berlin; www.plattformnachwuchsarchitekten.de | Theresa Keilhacker, Berlin The project director for Aedes is Ulla Giesler, info and photographic materials at aedes@baunetz.de.