WAI Architecture Think Tank

WAI new book Narrative Architecture now available online

To buy a copy or a collector's edition with postcard go to http://waithinktank.com/WAI-Shop (available within US, for international shipping of collector's edition write to contact(at)wai-architecture(dot)com

Book Description
What do the ideal cities of Le Corbusier, New Babylon of Constant, the first enclosed shopping mall, Brasilia, and Rem Koolhaas’ Delirious New York have in common? Is there a form of architecture devised to reveal the ideology hidden behind the design of buildings and entire cities? Is there a form of critical storytelling in architecture?

In the form of a Kynical Manifesto (a manifesto that bites), in Narrative Architecture Cruz Garcia and Nathalie Frankowski reconstruct six decades of the twentieth century to reveal the origins of one of the most powerful, misunderstood, and underutilized mediums of architectural critique, thinking, and representation.

Half historical storytelling, half graphic speculation, this vademecum in three parts weaves inseparable the ideological framework of Modernism, the post-war utopias of the present, and the narrative critiques post-1968. Mixing text with fifty collages (one for every year since the birth of Narrative Architecture), the book finds new relationships between the heroic, utopian, commercial, segregated, visionary, humorous, ironic and critical projects by Le Corbusier, Team 10, Constant, Yona Friedman, Salvador Dali, Victor Gruen, Lucio Costa, Minoru Yamasaki, Archizoom, Superstudio, Madelon Vriesendorp, and Rem Koolhaas.

Alluding to Diogenes of Sinope, the ancient Kynic who wandered with a lantern under plain daylight in search of an honest man, through narrative, archival, and provocative images and texts, Garcia and Frankowski lay out the groundwork in search of an honest architecture able to address the pressing challenges of our times.

Cruz Garcia and Nathalie Frankowski are architects, educators, co-directors of international studio WAI Architecture Think Tank, and authors of Pure Hardcore Icons: A Manifesto on Pure Form in Architecture.

ISBN 978-94-6208-524-4
Text and Images:
Cruz Garcia & Nathalie Frankowski / WAI Architecture Think Tank
design: Team Thursday
English | hardcover | 24 x 31 cm | 132 pages | in conjunction with: Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Michelle Garnaut, Institute of Optimistic Architectures, Jan Sobotka

What About WAI Think Tank New Website?

Follow WAI on www.waithinktank.com

For up-to-the-minute news, projects, essays, publications, exhibitions and presentations by WAI Think Tank / Garcia Frankowski visit the redesigned and updated www.waithinktank.com

What About WAI around the world in 2014?

WAI Think Tank / Garcia Frankowski Exhibitions in Guadalajara, Beijing and Shanghai, plus Publications in El Nuevo Dia (Puerto Rico) and Arch+ Double Issue Cover (Germany)

APR 22 2014
DIALECTICAL TERRITORIES EXHIBITION OPENS AT INTELLIGENTSIA GALLERY

Intelligentsia Gallery is currently presenting the group exhibition Dialectical Territories: Landscapes and Abstraction, including works by Olga Rodina (Moscow, 1982), Anastasia Soboleva (Kostroma, 1989) and Elena Tsibizova (Moscow, 1988) of Troyka Union; Li Wei (Harbin, 1979); Laura Gil Santana(Madrid, 1985); and WAI Think Tank Directors Cruz Garcia (San Juan, 1983) and Nathalie Frankowski (Dundee, 1985) of Garcia Frankowski.

With artworks that range from photography, to painting and sculpture, the exhibition challenges the territorial boundaries that often stand between Landscapes and Abstraction in the realm of contemporary art.

Opening April 20, 2014
Until May 24, 2014

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APR 20 2014
WAI FEATURED IN ARCHIZINES EXHIBITION GUADALAJARA

The Archizines travelling exhibition of independent and alternative architecture and urbanism publications is currently on display at Kukuruchos in Guadalajara, Mexico.

Archizines includes the WAIzine.
Read the WAIzine 1 Here and the WAIzine 2 Here.

Archizines will be on display from April 3 to May 4, 2014.

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APR 28 2014
WAI FEATURED IN MAKING COMMUNITY GROUP SHOW AT THE CFCCA MANCHESTER

Collages of WAI's Pure Hardcore Icons, the publication by Arfice Books on Architecture, the two first editions of the WAIzine and Garcia Frankowski's Poem of the Shapes are being displayed as part of the group exhibition 'Making Community' at the Centre for Chinese Contemporary Art (CFCCA) in Manchester. Curated by Bea Leanza the exhibitions opens the 11th of April.

More info from the CFCCA Website:
'Making Community - not the map nor the territory', participants and projects:

Participants names refer to those of initiators, many of these projects are the result of multiple contributions which are credited in the documentation provided on site of the show.

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MAR 20 2014
WAI FEATURED IN ARCH+ 214 and 215

The double issue of German architectural theory publication Arch+ has featured the German translations of Pure Hardcorism, The Shapes of Hardcore Architecture, and the project The Institute of Optimistic Architectures. Issues +214 and +215 also feature WAI’s collages on the cover.

From Arch+:

„Hardcore-Architektur“ ist eine direkte Antwort auf die Ausgabe „Think Global, Build Social!“, die sich aus einem spezifischen Blickwinkel mit den Folgen der Kritik an der Moderne auseinandersetzte, die spätestens seit den 1960er Jahren aufhörte, eine einheitliche Bewegung mit einem absoluten Wahrheitsanspruch zu sein. Als Gegenentwurf zum prozessualen und partizipativen Verständnis der Architektur stellen wir hier eine Generation von Architekten vor, die nach der Dominanz soziologischer und technologischer Fragestellungen im Architekturdiskurs der letzten Jahrzehnte wieder die intellektuelle Potenz der Form in den Vordergrund stellt.”

Access Issue +214 Here.

and Issue +215 Here.

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MAR 14 2014
PURE HARDCORE ICONS BOOK REVIEW IN BAUNETZ

BauNetz has published a review of Pure Hardcore Icons: A Manifesto on Pure Form in Architecture in German.

From the website: “Die Verwendung des Begriffs Hardcore kennen wir bisher im Zusammenhang mit Techno, Rap oder Pornografie. Im Londoner Artifice-Verlag ist nun ein Buch erschienen, das sich mit Hardcore-Architektur befasst. Das „Manifesto on Pure Form on Architecture“ ist eine architekturtheoretische und künstlerische Auseinandersetzung mit den radikalen Superzeichen der Architektur.”

For more info visit Baunetz here.

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MAR 16 2014
CRUZ GARCIA & NATHALIE FRANKOWSKI OF WAI TO PRESENT THEIR CHILDREN'S BOOK DURING CAPITAL LITERARY FESTIVAL BEIJING

Come and hear the charming story of a little girl and her rabbit and their journey from a city where the sun never sets. Inspiring authors, internationally acclaimed artists, architects and book creators Cruz Garcia & Nathalie Frankowski, have joined together to create 'The Story of the Little Girl and The Sun', where geometric shapes take center stage in a witty tale filled with fun.

Mar 22 11:00 a.m. - 13:00 p.m.

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FEB 06 2014
WAI THINK TANK / GARCIA FRANKOWSKI FEATURED IN FILM FESTIVAL UTOPIA, PARIS

French filmmaker and architect, Anne Philippe, will present “Estann or the Archipelagos of the Wandering Islands”, featuring works by Nathalie Frankowski and Cruz Garcia, on Sunday 09th of February at 4.30PM in the movie theater 2.

Cinétopia will be screened at Cinema l’ECRAN in Saint-Denis, Paris.

More information in French:

“A l’instar des rêves et des agencements mobiles d’images qui les composent, l’archipel d’Estann se reconfigure à chaque traversée d’une manière singulière. De l’île des limbes à l’île des devenirs, de la “ciné-architecture” aux chambres des rêveuses d’un film à venir, des propos sur l’art de Rilke à la grotte d’un sans abri, du noir de la salle de spectacle aux berges du canal de l’Ourcq, des jardins de l’A bao a qou aux villes invisibles… autant de traversées qui déploient des mondes possibles, esquissant par là même les contours d’une communauté à venir. Nous proposons une déambulation dans la carte à trois dimensions de l’archipel, où des fragments de textes remontés à la surface feront parfois écho à des séquences d’images inédites ou inachevées. Ces traversées seront propices à un voyage dans le futur d’un film en train de se faire.”

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JAN 26 2014
GARCIA FRANKOWSKI EXHIBITION ‘EXPERIMENTS ON FORM’ OPENS AT INTELLIGENTSIA GALLERY

Recent art works by WAI Think Tank directors Cruz Garcia and Nathalie Frankowski are in display at Intelligentsia Gallery in Beijing. The alternative art space opened its doors for the first time with the vernisage of ‘Garcia Frankowski Experiments on Form’ the 25th of January.

The exhibition that includes Paintings, collages and objects will be on display until the end of February. For more info you can visit Intelligentsia Gallery website.

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JAN 26 2014
WAI HAS BEEN FEATURED IN PUERTO RICO’S MAIN NEWSPAPER EL NUEVO DIA

Puerto Rico’s main newspaper published an extensive overview of WAI Think Tank and Garcia Frankowski’s recent projects including the NCCA proposal in Moscow, the book Pure Hardcore Icons: A Manifesto on Pure Form in Architecture (London, 2013) and group and solo exhibitions around the world. Journalist Carmen Graciela Diaz’ ‘Construccion Continua’ (Continuous Construction); ‘El Vigor tiene forma’ (Vigour Has Form) article and interview was featured on the ‘Por Dentro’ special section on Saturday January 18.

What About WAI in Archizines Shanghai?

WAI to present the WAIzine in Archizines Exhibition Opening, Shanghai

WAI will be part of the opening panel discussion of the Shanghai leg of the Archizines World Tour of independent and alternative architectural publications. The exhibition that will be displayed in the Shanghai Study Centre of the University of Hong Kong, will include alongside WAI, Elias Redstone, curator of Archizines, Li Juan, Daan Roggeveen curator of the Study Centre.

What About the NCCA ГЦСИ?

ГЦСИ

Manifesto

The NCCA is the new epicentre for the creation, study, and support of contemporary art in Russia.

Enhanced by the dialectic between the city and architecture, between art and the public, between landscape and building, the new NCCA marks a paradigm shift of international museology. By creating a building that invites and embraces the public through its open spaces the new NCCA blurs the lines between building and context, between art and life.
The NCCA is not a building in the city; it is an extension of it. The flexible autonomy of its spaces either enclosed or outdoors, makes it the first archetype of Museum as City.
Instead of emulating the boundary that usually separates museums from their context, the new NCCA building is an Open Museum. The arrangement of the volumes on the ground level allows the public to freely circulate through its open spaces creating a new urban museum experience.
The new NCCA is not a building within a park; the park and the building are inseparable. Linked by way of a harmonious symbiosis, a series of paths direct the public between metro station, park and building in an effortless journey that offers glimpses of outdoor sculptures in an environment for the contemplation of art.

The new NCCA brings art to the public. The building creates a promenade in which people interact with exhibition pieces featured in the public space and on the multiple terraces of the building.

The layout of the NCCA consists of a ground level that contains public programs, creative residences, office space, conference halls and the collection repository, and three volumes of varying heights that intersect at different points creating a maze of flexible exhibition space.

The NCCA is not just a center for the arts; it is a building as Manifesto.

Project:

New National Center for Contemporary Arts

International Competition, Shortlisted

Moscow

45,000m2

Program: Hall Zone, Creative Residences, Administrative Offices, Media Center, Children Educational Center, Exhibition Halls, Café, Store

Project Team

WAI Architecture Think Tank:

Cruz Garcia

Nathalie Frankowski

Edgar Garcia

Zhang Yanping

Yu Yihua

Anna Popova

Ilyas Sadybekov

Structure:

+G:

Felix Cruz Marcos

Laura Gil Santana

Technology and Sustainability:

Alejandra Garcia Hooghuis

Museology Consultant:

Evgenia Novgorodova

What About WAI at M Capital?

WAI presents Published and on-going Books

WAI offered the lecture "Art, Architecture & Books: Manifestoes, Forms and Fictions" at the prestigious M Capital in Beijing. The presentation focused on the work of WAI and Garcia Frankowski through the process of making books.

What About Pure Hardcore Icons Presentation?

WAI PRESENTS PURE HARDCORE ICONS AT THE FACTORY

WAI offered the lecture “Pure Hardcore Icons: A Manifesto in Two Parts” at the auditorium in The Factory in Dashilar, Beijing. The presentation focused on the works presented in the exhibition and publication Pure Hardcore Icons. The Lecture and Exhibition is part of Beijing Design Week 2013. Video coming soon.

What About the NCCA?

WAI HAS BEEN Shortlisted as finalist FOR THE NEW NATIONAL CENTRE FOR CONTEMPORARY ARTS IN MOSCOW

WAI has been selected as a finalist and will now compete in the final for the design of the New National Centre for Contemporary Arts in Moscow. A total of 10 finalist were selected among proposals from around the world. Five finalist were selected due to their portfolio, while the remaining five were selected by their concept proposals.

From the official website:

“During the press conference on October 1, 2013 competition Jury announced the names of 10 participants of the second phase of the International competition for the architectural concept of museum and exhibition complex of the New National centre for contemporary arts.”

PARTICIPANTS IN THE SECOND STAGE OF THE COMPETITION IN THE CATEGORY OF “DOSSIER”:

Steven Holl

Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos

Heneghan Peng

51N4E

Alejandro Aravena

PARTICIPANTS IN THE SECOND STAGE OF THE COMPETITION IN THE CATEGORY OF “PRELIMINARY CONCEPT”:

UNK Project (Moscow)

WAI Architecture Think Tank (China)

Anton Barklyanski (Perm)

Melorama (Moscow)

Ghirardelli Giancarlo Architect (Italy)

What About Lecture at The Factory?

We are happy to invite you to join WAI Think Tank this Wednesday, October 2 at 6:00pm at the auditorium of the Factory for the presentation and discussion of Pure Hardcore Icons: A Manifesto in Two Parts.

The presentation and discussion will be focused on the manifesto exhibition currently on display at the Factory and the publication of Pure Hardcore Icons: A Manifesto on Pure Form in Architecture (London: Artifice Books, 2013).

You are welcome to visit the exhibition before the talk.

Date: October 2, 2013

Time: 6:00pm

Venue: The Factory

Dawailangying #8

Dashilar

Xicheng District

Beijing

大外廊营胡同8号

北京市西城区

What About Pure Hardcore Icons at BJDW?

Pure Hardcore Icons Manifesto Exhibition Opens

The Manifesto Exhibition Pure Hardcore Icons opened at The Factory in Dashilar to initiate the 2013 version of Beijing Design Week. The exhibition includes the original collages from the book Pure Hardcore Icons (Artifice Books on Architecture, 2013), as well as sculpture/objects, animations, and paintings by Garcia Frankowski.

The Official Book release and Lecture is scheduled for October 3, at 6:00pm.