It’s About Time

IT’S ABOUT TIME, the 10th edition of the Architecture Biennale Rotterdam, showcases the work of some 50 spatial designers, architects and researchers who are addressing the future of our planet in an inspiring way. Taking the Club of Rome’s report Limits to Growth, published exactly 50 years ago as its starting point, the exhibition explores how time pressure is increasing and the current momentum for radical transitions. The exhibition offers prospects for action and shows how we can use spatial design to tackle the current ecological crisis. This centers on the question of how we can design our world in a literally sustainable way and what is transition architecture? 
 
The exhibition features work by names such as: 2001; 2050+; 51N4E; AgwA; Anupama Kundoo; AREP; Atelier Julien Boidot and Jean Souviron; Bart Feberwee, Ecem Sarıçayır, and Hacer Bozkurt; BC Architects, Assemble and LUMA Arles; Bêka & Lemoine; Bureau Bas Smets; Encore Heureux Architectes; Rebellion; Flux landscape architecture; Foundation for Achieving Seamless Territory (FAST)/ Malkit Shoshan; Incursiones; Irene Feria Prados, Frieder Vogler, and Rik de Brouwer; Janna Bystrykh; Jo Taillieu Architecten; Kraaijvanger Architects; LIST/ Ido Avissar; MLA+; Philippe Rizzotti Architecte, ETH Zürich, and Pavillon de l'Arsenal; Monadnock; MVRDV NEXT; noAarchitecten; Office for Political Innovation/ Andrés Jaque with Miguel Mesa del Castillo; OOZE Architects & Urbanists; Openfabric/ Francesco Garofalo; ORG Permanent Modernity; Paola Viganò, Elena Cogato Lanza, and Tommaso Pietropolli; Richard Weller; Rotor and RotorDC; SJG/ Joost Grootens; Space & Matter and Common City Development; Studio Marco Vermeulen/ Marco Vermeulen; Studio Ossidana and Embassy of the North Sea; Superuse Studios; Turenscape/ Kongjian Yu; Werkstatt.

Potential solutions
The exhibition showcases perspectives and solutions on how to build towards desirable futures: from research driven analysis and visionary proposals to realized projects. IT’S ABOUT TIME distinguishes three design attitudes: of the Ancestor, the Activist and the Accelerator. The Ancestor connects the present with the past and the distant future to rethink current lifestyles. One of them is Anupama Kundoo (Pune, India and Berlin, Germany), who in her work slows down construction processes and works with local labor and local materials. The Activist strives for a hands-on approach resulting in (often) bottom-up, community driven projects which intervene in the public realm or media. One example is the installation Energies Désespoirs by Parisian architects Encore Heureux and artist BonneFrite, which is the result of a participatory community project on hope and despair in a world awaiting recovery. The Accelerator deploys technology to accelerate the transition of existing systems through innovation. The video installation by the Milanese interdisciplinary agency 2050+ explores how the development of in-vitro meat can have a positive spatial impact on the landscape on a global scale, while also paying attention to the ethical questions this technology raises. 
 
Forcing change 
Forcing change and enabling an effective transition often requires a combination of attitudes. Chinese landscape architect Kongjian Yu developed an alternative vision for the relationship of city and nature in Chinese urbanized areas. He proactively approached mayors and political leaders and got them on board with a new climate adaptation policy. He developed smart innovations, for example for filtering and storing rainwater in cities. 
 
Contemporary landscape shows glimmers of hope 
Analysis is another tool to stimulate transition. The exhibition brings together studies by architects and urban designers into the causes and consequences of climate change in a contemporary landscape. While the overall picture is bleak, there are also glimmers of hope. Malkit Shoshan studied the development of the Israeli Negev desert: once labeled an arid landscape to be conquered with artificial irrigation, it is now a battleground of social injustice and unsustainable ‘greening’ projects. Janna Bystrykh portrays the North American Midwest, where the new neighbors of large-scale industrial farms are more and more often regenerative farmers. 
 
Historical pioneering examples 
The backbone of the exhibition is made up of a historical overview of the development of environmental awareness from the 1970s to the present. The timeline shows that many insights and solutions were already known 50 years ago, when the Club of Rome published the report The Limits to Growth. The architecture of O.M. Ungers’s Solar House and Lacaton & Vassal’s Maison Latapie are still relevant today. Yet for a long time these were merely seen as pioneer examples, and not widely imitated. Now, a rapidly growing number of people are aware of the urgency of climate change and these ideas are being widely adopted. 
 
Transition arena 
The 10th edition of the Architecture Biennale Rotterdam will be more than an exhibition. Working sessions will take place in a so-called transition arena; participants will include designers involved in ongoing research into the transformation of cities such as Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Tilburg. They will bring together and discuss different visions for the future of the Netherlands. 

On invitation of IABR Director Saskia van Stein, curators: Derk Loorbach, Véronique Patteeuw, Léa-Catherine Szacka, Peter Veenstra.
 
Click here for the press invitation. Click here for the press kit.