Architekturbiennale 2023

Factsheet

Format: Sponsoring: Art in architecture/Exhibition

Location: Austrian Pavilion, Venice Biennale of Architecture 2023, Viale XXIV Maggio, 2, 30132 Venezia VE, Italy

Time frame: 05-11/2023

Curators: The AKT Architecture Collective & Hermann Czech

Artists: AKT (Fabian Antosch, Gerhard Flora, Max Hebel, Adrian Judt, Julia Klaus, Lena Kohlmayr, Philipp Krummel, Gudrun Landl, Lukas Lederer, Susanne Mariacher, Christian Mörtl, Philipp Oberthaler, Charlie Rauchs, Helene Schauer, Kathrin Schelling, Philipp Stern, Harald Trapp) & Hermann Czech

Info/Scope: For the 18th Venice Biennale of Architecture, BUWOG sponsored the socially impactful, temporary conversion of the Austrian Pavilion on the city’s Giardini exhibition grounds, with the idea of opening up for the local population and enabling their participation as well as offering an extensive preliminary and accompanying programme with the residents, workshops and symposia with political institutions and local initiatives, and the ongoing presence of the curators.

AKT Architekturkollektiv & Hermann Czech: Partecipazione/Beteiligung / Participation

In Partecipazione / Beteiligung AKT & Hermann Czech thematise the constant demand for an openness of spaces and for participation. The sociopolitical architectural concept extends far beyond a structural intervention and aims to democratise the elitist site with respect towards the city and its people.

The Austrian Pavilion, designed by Josef Hoffmann and Robert Kramreiter in 1934, is located on the northeastern edge of the Giardini in the residential neighbourhood of Castello, away from Venice’s tourist areas. Although it is located in the city centre, with respect to content and location the Venice Biennale of Architecture is closed off to the municipality and its spatial needs and to issues of “overtourism”, of which it is a partial cause. As a reversal of the continuous expansion of this large-scale exhibition, Partecipazione / Beteiligung sought to cede space by dividing the pavilion: in the west, it would remain open to the exhibition’s public, while in the east – freely accessible to Venetians – it would serve as a visible space for the neighbourhood. Despite intensive planning and negotiations, the actual realisation was denied by the municipal and exhibition authorities, whereby the concept had already taken into account such a rejection of the initiative.