The publication, ROME REDUX, was presented and released on Saturday, April 15th at the MAXXI Museum auditorium before an audience of Pratt Institute dignitaries that included the President, two Vice Presidents, the SOA Dean, and UA Chair, retiring and incoming Rome Program directors and graduates of the program from nearly every one of its 50 years.
IDC Foundation MOD/FAB
Showcasing mass timber and experiential learning
Frederick Biehle and EJ Seong are presenting the work of their 3 IDC-funded studios on MASS TIMBER as part of a more comprehensive exhibition studios shared in the original grant secured under former chair Erika Hinrichs. The exhibit was open from September 1st, 2022 until Sept 20th.
Forma Civitas
Frederick Biehle’s article, The Actual and Its Double was included in the International Journal of Urban and Territorial Morphological Studies published by Grunberg Verlag, Weimar and Rostock. The journal was edited by Alessandro Camiz, Giorgio Verdiani, and Martin Ebert. It is also available at GREEN OPEN ACCESS: J123-2020-FC; ISSN 2748-2812 (print); ISSN 2748-3134 (online); ISBN: 9783933713681.
Society of Archeology, Art, and Architecture of Rome (ISAR)
On July 19th, 2021 Frederick Biehle was invited to present his Lecture “Ariadne’s Thread: Getting Lost in History” as a keynote to the International Summer School in Abruzzo, Italy organized by ISAR
International Making Cities Livable (IMCL)
On May 20th, 2022 Frederick Biehle presented his paper Reinventing Public Housing: Restoring the Infrastructure of Community that Modernism Left Out as part of a 15 Minute Cities Session at the 38th gathering of the conference in Le Plessis-Robinson, France
The Fallen Church Matera, Italy
On May 15th, 2020 viaARCHITECTURE submitted a proposal to Reuse the Fallen Church- Chiesa Diruta of Grottole, Matera.
LACRIMOSA (REQUIEM)
Full of tears will be that day When from the ashes shall arise…
The fallen church is risen again, metamorphosed from architectural ruin into an instrument of remembrance and performance. It has become a voluminous space of sound and celebration returned to the city of Matera as well as an instrument of ongoing performance, reenacting the historical and environmental role of rainwater conservation, brought to life with its own Stravinsky fountain.
The 16th century remains are stabilized and allowed to determine the performance hall as a nested form within a new space defining envelope. The envelopes’ structure is entirely of mass timber, supported by glue laminated columns that emerge from the central space like a forest of trees to support an array of discordant and parallel V-shaped trusses. The trusses fold downward toward the center so that the roof can act as a collector of rainwater. The collected water travels down the columns and across demarcated paths embedded in the floor terminating with a set of tubular scuppers that, like trumpets, project the water as a performance into a monumental basin, an urban scale fountain set adjacent to the lower entrance. The side walls of the envelope are hung from the trusses to fit tautly over the masonry church form like a glove. The exterior cladding is standing seam lightweight steel, and it is punctuated with windows that, like musical notes, resonate with those of the structure that remains.
The orientation of the original church has been reversed to allow the lower level to act as a vestibule with coat room, gift shop and ticket booth. Above this, at the top of the stair, is the entry to the performance hall with a balcony over the entrance, and an interior bar. Bathrooms and dressing rooms occupy an ancillary structure to the original basilica. The stage sits in the position of the original church vestibule, the eroded corner becoming a second means of entrance. Like a gothic cathedral the emphasis is vertical, onto the new material presence lofted above and illuminated. The columnar displacement in line of sight is counterbalanced by video monitors which occupy all parts of the interior space.
NYC Housing
On February 26th, 2020 Frederick Biehle was invited by the University of Dundee student lecture series to present. He spoke about three interrelated affordable housing issues: 1) an examination as to how public housing in NYC came to be characterized by the “tower in the park” paradigm, 2) whether its alternative- the first project constructed by the NYCHA designed by Frederick Ackerman might still be viable today and 3) his design studio work that proposes “completing” the NYCHA superblocks to reintegrate them with the surrounding city.
Research Practice & Activism About Racial Justice
On November 11th, Frederick Biehle presented his Studio based research into the Reinventing the NYCHA superblock as part of the first Pratt School of Architecture Racial Justice Flashtalks series
Melbourne Affordable Housing Challenge
On December 8th, 2020 viaARCHITECTURE participated in the Melbourne Affordable Housing Challenge hosted by Beebreeders.
The 1960s saw both a rejection of the monumental vision for public housing and a dissolution of the political responsibility to continue creating it. Aldo Rossi’s critique was at the center of the European rejection. Architecture of the City was a protest against the aesthetic functionalism that had been embraced by the public housing industry. Rossi rejected the architectural avant-garde’s attempt to turn the ordinary into an agent of revolution. He declared that
“(…) housing must be ordinary, something that recedes into the fabric of the city, and not something that stands forward from it; that residential buildings are fabric, not monuments, and only by continuing to be fabric can they make a positive contribution to the city as a collective work.”
The Victoria State Government established its Housing Commission in 1938. In spite of the failure of tower-in-the-park modernism in both America and Europe and the success of its own prefabrication plants, it would choose to abandon its lower rise, higher density track record for Melbourne. Between 1964 and 1970 twenty-eight sites across nineteen suburbs in inner Melbourne would be cleared and developed with forty-seven 20-30 story high rise housing blocks situated in unadorned natural landscapes.
This proposal seeks to provide new affordable housing by re-urbanizing Melbourne’s public housing sites- introducing a new low-rise infill to both engage the surrounding streets, integrate certain commercial and retail adjacencies, offer 2nd floor amenities and services for the larger constituency and better define its landscapes, the now intra-block gardens, to better allow for recreational leisure.
Cities in Evolution
On April 29, 2021 Frederick Biehle was invited to present his paper The Actual and Its Double at the 8th Annual International Symposium of the Architecture, Archaeology, and Contemporary City Planning (AACCP) at Ozyegin University, Istanbul Turkey.
