Crisis Formalism
Flash Art Volumes addresses the broader issues surrounding design and art publications, positioning itself as a new starting point. By incorporating economics, theoretical analysis, and market considerations, it redefines content relationships and establishes itself as a carrier of value. It shapes waves of attention and sets a new tone: amplification.
After the release of the first issue of Flash Art Volumes, “Anti-Composition,” in 2024, guest curated by Armature Globale, the upcoming Vol. 002 will be curated by Michael Abel and Nile Greenberg of ANY, New York. This second issue, titled “Crisis Formalism,” is set for publication in April 2025.
“Volumes 002 is the second installment of our architecture and design research series. From the beginning, Flash Art has recognized that architecture is a highly relevant and pressing topic that transcends its conventional definition. It encompasses issues of politics and our responsibilities towards contemporary society,” states Gea Politi, Director and Editor-in-Chief of Flash Art.
“Volumes 002, guest edited by ANY, will be the second release of the magazine, this time focusing on the practice of architectural formalism during a time of polycrisis. It will not simply be another issue about design products. I am excited to collaborate with Michael and Nile to make Volumes bigger,” shares Alessio Avventuroso, Creative Director of Flash Art.
“When Volumes was created, it was the perfect platform to shift architecture from a dead disciplinary kink to another form of mass culture,” Armature Globale says. “It is ok to say it was an architectural magazine and it shall take ANY form architecture formalizes into. Even if it is just ANY other form, Michael and Nile are the perfect duo to channel this late disciplinary outlet into an overdue restyling.”
New York, November 22, 2024
In an age marked by Morin’s “polycrisis,”[1] where systems buckle under the relentless convergence of economic, geopolitical, and environmental pressures, architecture finds itself unsettlingly adrift. Institutions – nominally orchestrating change by foregrounding policy – marginalize architecture’s agency to the point of erasure. This withdrawal from form in architecture, a kind of quietest surrender, leaves the field vulnerable to capture by corporate entities who, unrestrained, exploit crises for profit, bending space to serve a calculus of capital. The proposal argues for architecture’s re-engagement with form – not merely as an aesthetic choice, but as a material interrogation of contemporary crises.
And yet, the reality of these crises is reconfiguring the field in unforeseen ways, bringing new forms to architecture. Here, form denotes the tangible elements of geometry, structure, aperture, and composition – those elemental conditions that shape our interaction with space. The forms emerging from these crises are not uniform. They are analyzed by a multiplicity of new theories spanning media, economies, construction and materials, space, and climate, raising perennial questions about purpose and impact of architecture. This brings us to a crossroads: should architecture embrace complexity as a pathway to optimism, or has catastrophe already arrived and architecture should confront us with the collapse?[2] No established binary seems adequate, and we find ourselves searching for an approach that defies simple categorization.
To consider aesthetics and form as either a response to or an outcome of polycrisis places us within the ambiguous politics of potential annihilation. We thus recognize the pressing need for a critical framework capable of navigating this volatile political terrain. In response, we turn to architects, designers, and theorists who grapple with these complexities in their work. Through curated editorial perspectives, research inquiries, architectural critiques, artworks, and white papers, we endeavor to clarify and advance our understanding of architecture’s evolving significance amidst crisis.
– Michael Abel, Nile Greenberg
ANY, New York City
[1] Morin, Edgar & Kern, Anne Bridgette, Homeland Earth: A Manifesto for the New Millennium, Hampton Press, 1999.
[2] Benjamin Ware, On Extinction: Beginning Again At The End, Verso Books, New York, 2024.
Abel Nile New York (ANY) approaches architecture as a means to examine, synthesize, and formalize structures, materials, crises, organizations, cultures, and media. ANY (est. 2020) is led by partners Michael Abel and Nile Greenberg with designers Reese Lewis, Sam Golini, Sampath Pediredla, and Tove Agélii. Selected projects include: Multifamily Housing, Peachland (2026); Hill Stone House, Los Angeles (2026); Vowels, New York City (2024); OBG Headquarters, New York City (2024); Remediated Performance, Indio (2023); Sejong Performing Arts Center, Seoul (2023); Seoul Metropolitan Library, Seoul (2023); Repair Column, Tokyo (2023); Manor Rock Farm, Hudson Valley (2021); and Homer, New York City (2021). Among ANY’s recent presentations, lectures, and publications are “Diagnosis, Mediation, Faith” (2024, Milan, Dropcity); “On Value” (2023, ETH Zurich); “Untitled” (2023, AIA Center For Architecture New York); “Flipper” (2022, The Cooper Union); “New HQ!” (2021, Spazio Maiocchi); The Advanced School of Collective Feeling (2023, Park Books); and Two Sides of the Border (2020, Lars Müller).
