Ceiling: Elements of Architecture © Ryder Richards
Rem Koolhaas and AMO
Elements of Architecture [link]
Venice Architecture Biennale 2014 [link]
Giardini, Central Pavilion
Venice, Italy
Entering to find a myriad of exposed duct-work over a drop-down ceiling in a classic cupola makes for great spectacle, a metaphor of the old contrasted with shiny space-age portals issuing forth nothing and leading nowhere. Roaming through the massive rooms overladen with a vocabulary of stairs, building skins, toilets, balconies or flooring the Pavilion functions as educational trade fair exhibit attempting to re-assert the historicity of constituent elements. Offering little concept the pavilion overwhelms with quantity and gadget engagement, implying architecture has forgotten the basics in favor of theory and must be patronizingly re-grounded by an entrenched authority figure.
