Lecture date: 2004-03-09
Diagrams typically condense information; in our practice we have generated diagrams that (re)define urban structures as sites of mobility, and programs as places of popular access. Those diagrams are intended to show what is actually happening on a location . . . The design model represents to us the most promising contemporary potential of architecture; it is both generic and specific, abstract yet solid, simple yet infinite . . . it offers a potential route towards standardizing the Non-Standard and thereby a means to promote ambitious, visionary expressions of architecture beyond the purely incidental or highly personal.
Ben van Berkel studied at the Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam and at the AA. In 1988 he and Caroline Bos set up a practice in Amsterdam, realising, among other projects, the Erasmus bridge and the Moebius house. In 1998 they established a new firm: UN Studio (United Net).
Van Berkel is currently Professor of Conceptual Design at the Staedelschule in Frankfurt am Main.
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