Re-practice, Re-visit, Re-turn News from the School of Art, Architecture and Design

Postgraduate Architecture students exhibit in Antwerp as part of international project.

Students from Postgraduate Architecture - Unit 8 led by Takero Shimizaki Architects (t-sa) on the MArch ( RIBA Part 2) course at The Cass are among the participants in a collaborative research project to be exhibited in at deSingel in Antwerp, Belgium. Within their year-long exploration of finite islands in the city, Unit 8 has collaborated this winter with practice Architecten De Vylder Vinck Tailleu in their ongoing re-visiting of Flemish architecture masters and are now invited to be part of a new exhibition in Antwerp, curated by ADVVT with the Flanders Architecture Institute (VAI).

Running from 21 February - 14 June 2020 at deSingel, RE-PRACTICE, RE-VISIT, RE-TURN showcases the results of design-based research carried out by ADVVT in collaboration with Tokyo Institute of Technology; Unit 8 at The Cass, London; and Istanbul Kadir Has University.

During a series of collaborative workshops and presentations involving the unit, t-sa, ADVVT, Philip Christou and a series of guests, and their design studio work, Unit 8 participated to the research by carefully recording a series of modern Flemish works. Extrapolating them from their original condition and context, the unit has proceeded to transcribe them in the urban space of Battersea, London.

As a result of this process, original projects from Juliaan Lampens, Jos Van Driessche, René Heyvaert and Jacques Dupuis, reduced to their essence, appeared in Battersea as an uneven collection of islands. These infiltrated the urban space, adding complexity through a play of scale and proportion, altering formal relations and revealing possible uses as public gardens, viewing platforms, open air rooms, markets, schools or monasteries.

Watch a video about RE-PRACTICE, RE-VISIT, RE-TURN here.

Image: student work from Unit 8 for RE-PRACTICE, RE-VISIT, RE-TURN