In February we announced Open Call - a call for pro-neighborhood projects and ideas for the 8th Oslo Architecture Triennale. Selected proposals were collected in an international digital catalog of good practices - Neighborhood Index. Among them were two projects from Poland: Circle Form by Pawel Grobelny and the neighborhood-inclusive programs of the Józef Piłsudski Museum in Sulejówek organized by Grupa Celowa - Janusz Byszewski, Beata Nessel-Łukasik and Mariusz Libel.
Neighborhood Index is a catalog of proposals, projects and practices from all over the world collected during an open call, which fit the slogan of this year's Oslo Architecture Triennale - "Mission Neighborhood - (Re)forming Communities."
Photo: Mikkel Eye, SLA
Out of nearly four hundred submissions, a jury consisting of Francesco Garutti (curator at the Canadian Centre for Architecture), Matevž Čelik (founder and program director of Future Architecture Platform), Camilla van Deurs (Architect of the City of Copenhagen), Jenny B. Osuldsen (partner at Snøhetta studio and professor of landscape architecture at NTNU) and Christian Pagh (director and curator of OAT) selected 251, which were collected in the aforementioned catalog. Six of them will be presented at the main exhibition in Oslo (these will be proposals by: Vienna-based StudioVlayStreeruwitz, Stockholm-based MANDAWORKS, London-based Croydon Placemaking, Scott Lloyd (TEN Studio) & Alexis Kalagas from Zurich and Belgrade, jaja architects from Copenhagen, and Art and Design Collective Oaza from Zagreb, Croatia), and seven received honorable mention from the jury.
Neighborhoods are crucial to our urban communities. The numerous works submitted to the Oslo Triennial show the diverse ways in which we can work to reimagine what great neighborhoods are, and how we can ensure that they are environmentally friendly, sustainable and equitable, guaranteeing vitality and a thriving planet for future generations, and become a place to call home," said jury member and Copenhagen City Architect Camilla van Deurs.
The submitted projects and ideas were divided into eight thematic groups: Streets with (New) Meaning; Public Performances; Social Infrastructure; Ways of Living, Ways of Sharing; Transforming, Adapting, Reusing; Nature - Wilder and Greener; Manufacturing and Commercial Diversity; Rethinking Processes and Management.
An unusual piece of urban furniture by Pawel Grobelny - Circle Form, which is a minimalist circle of wood and corten located in Poznan's Chwaliszewo that simultaneously functions as a square, a bench and a platform - fits into the Public Performance category. Its open form encourages its use in a variety of ways, and shows that through a small gesture it is possible to create an attractive and functional space that will serve the residents. As the author emphasizes, the great value of Circle Form is the fact that it was created from a grassroots, neighborhood initiative.
Circle Form in Poznań
© Pawel Grobelny
The second of the Polish proposals was assigned to as many as three categories - Public performances; Ways of living, ways of sharing; Transforming, adapting, reusing. We are talking about the three programs implemented around the then nascent Museum of Józef Piłsudski in Sulejówek, which aimed to create methods and tools for practicing good neighborliness and building urban community - "I am standing in front of some bizarre trunk", "Multiple realities" and "Panorama" by Janusz Byszewski, Beata Nessel-Lukasik and Mariusz Libel. The activities carried out, according to the developers of the programs, made it possible to create the concept of a relational museum, develop the idea of a good neighborhood in a museum, and develop a methodology that can help other cultural institutions increase their impact on the neighborhood and expand their active presence in the neighborhood.
TheOslo Architecture Triennale, which A&B has covered as a media sponsor, will begin on September 21. Detailed information can be found on the event's website.
