The new paradigm in architecture - Theory

Architectural Review, The, Feb, 2003 by Charles Jencks

5 MVRDV, Dutch Pavilion, EXPO 2000, Hanover. A stack of synthetic ecologies and artificial grounds determined as a statistical representation of the future Dutch landscape. From tise top dowucan be found l)windmills, and water on the artificial lake that flows into 2) sheets of water in an exhibition space and then to 3) a forest grown with high-powered lights. Next level down 4) is an auditorium with projection space, to 5) an agricultural section of smaller plants again artificially lit, to reach 6) a ground floor and grotto of houses and shops. Views and movement are celebrated by the exterior staircase. The sustainability of the closed cycle makes sense, the juxtaposition of gardens and moods is a delight, the remorseless logic humorous, but the question is raised: 'will all of life be managed and pharmed?' No wonder a vocal group in Holland want more wilderness (MVRDV).

6 Foreign Office Architects (FOA): Moussavi & Zaero-Polo, Yokohama International Port Terminal, 1995-2002. The landform building as infrastructure and folded landscape of activities. Like the blob building the landform tends to merge floor, wall and roof in a seamless continuity. The architects do not intend the appropriate ship, water and wave metaphors, but like Mies van der Rohe seek a neutral, generic and technological architecture-yet they allow emergence of the unintended.

7 Daniel Libeskind, Imperial War Museum of the North, Trafford, Manchester, 1999-2002. A symbolic, spiritual and cosmic architecture is still relatively rare but a few architects are trying. Here the globe shattered through conflict is reassembled as three curved shards: the tall Air Shard, marks the entrance, and holds flying instruments of war in its open structure; the Earth Shard is a huge exhibition area with even the floor curving gently, the Water Shard curves down to the adjacent canal and minesweeper moored there. This huge expressive structure is both a giant advertisement, in the sense of Venturi's Duck Building, and an enigmatic signifier of conflict and its resolutions.