Latest news with #19thVeniceArchitectureBiennale
Straits Times
23-05-2025
- General
- Straits Times
Design Cues: Singapore serves up feast of citymaking ideas at Venice biennale
Visitors at the Rasa-Tabula-Singapura exhibition at the Singapore Pavilion at the Arsenale in Venice. The pavilion is part of the 19th Venice Architecture Biennale. PHOTO: GIULIO BOEM Visitors at the Rasa-Tabula-Singapura exhibition at the Singapore Pavilion at the Arsenale in Venice. The pavilion is part of the 19th Venice Architecture Biennale. PHOTO: GIULIO BOEM SINGAPORE – Pull up a chair at the world's most diverse table at the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale, where the Singapore Pavilion transforms the act of dining into a celebration of citymaking through food, culture and collective design. To mark Singapore's 60th year of independence (SG60), the pavilion invites the world to experience its Table of Superdiversity, defined by the island's distinctive identity, shaped by centuries of movement, exchange and reinvention. In urban planning, superdiversity refers to the multifaceted nature of diversity in societies, particularly in urban areas, as a result of complex migration patterns. It goes beyond ethnic diversity and considers factors such as legal status, socio-economic conditions and individual identities. The Singapore Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale 2025 was launched on May 9 and will be open to the public till Nov 23. Called Rasa-Tabula-Singapura, this year's theme combines ancient languages as a play on the architectural term 'tabula rasa', meaning 'blank slate' in Latin. Using local desserts or 'kueh' as a leitmotif, some of Singapore's most distinctive landmarks have been converted into sumptuous desserts, designed as food for thought. Walk around the installation and one will find Housing Board blocks that look like kueh salat ('glutinous rice and custard' in Malay), Golden Mile Complex converted into kueh lapis ('layer cake' in Malay) and the Art Science Museum as huat kueh ('lucky cake' in Hokkien). Housing Board blocks that look like kueh salat ('glutinous rice and custard' in Malay). PHOTOS: DR IMMANUEL KOH, ARTIFICIAL-ARCHITECTURE, SUTD The Venice Architecture Biennale is the world's leading exhibition on architectural ideas and innovation, held every two years in Venice, Italy. The 2025 edition, the exhibition's 19th, features a record 66 national pavilions. The biennale transforms Venice into a living laboratory with exhibitions and installations across the historic Giardini della Biennale, the vast Arsenale and other sites from palaces to public squares. The ArtScience Museum as huat kueh ('lucky cake' in Hokkien). PHOTOS: DR IMMANUEL KOH, ARTIFICIAL-ARCHITECTURE, SUTD The Singapore curatorial team looked at how the idea of 'tabula rasa' is often associated with the tearing down of old buildings. But it is also about expanding, regenerating and recreating. The team reinterpreted it as 'Rasa' ('taste' in Malay), 'Tabula' ('table' in Latin) and 'Singapura', derived from the Sanskrit words 'simha' (lion) and 'pur' (city). The Golden Mile Complex as kek lapis ('layer cake' in Malay). PHOTOS: DR IMMANUEL KOH, ARTIFICIAL-ARCHITECTURE, SUTD The pavilion was commissioned by the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) and DesignSingapore Council (DSG), and organised by the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD). The multidisciplinary team of curators includes Professor Tai Lee Siang, Professor Khoo Peng Beng, Professor Erwin Viray, Dr Jason Lim, Assistant Professor Immanuel Koh and Associate Professor Sam Conrad Joyce. The team has curated a 'menu' of architectural and urban planning projects, with 'main courses' highlighting key developments and districts such as Pinnacle@Duxton, an iconic public housing development in Singapore. 'Side dishes' showcase innovations in design, policy and community-building , which contribute to the nation's strength as a multicultural powerhouse in the region . The Pavilion's tablescape reflects and applies biennale curator Carlo Ratti's overarching theme of 'Intelligens. Natural. Artificial. Collective'. This explores how different forms of intelligence – drawn from nature, technology (such as artificial intelligence or AI) and collective human effort – can help architecture respond to urgent global challenges such as the climate crisis. Co-curator Prof Khoo relates his own experience designing the 50-storey HDB project Pinnacle@Duxton, completed in 2009, which explored vertical living as a framework for superdiversity – where density, design and innovation came together in the sky . Prof Khoo and his wife, architect Belinda Huang, are the founders of home-grown practice Arc Studio Architecture + Urbanism. They collaborated with RSP Architects Planners and Engineers on the project. 'With Pinnacle@Duxton, we moved from single developments to district-scale planning,' says Prof Khoo, who is also head of the SUTD's Architecture and Sustainable Design Pillar. 'Projects like Tengah and Changi Airport demonstrate how Singapore applies the same design sensibility to shaping entire ecosystems of liveability and movement,' he says. 'These ideas continue through our research and teaching at SUTD, where planning for the future means designing for complexity. It's one expression of a city always planning ahead, always becoming.' Another example on display on the dining table is CapitaSpring, a 280m-tall tropical high-rise in the heart of Singapore's Central Business District that illustrates the city's progressive planning. The biophilic spectacle is a showcase of Singapore's Landscaping for Urban Spaces and High-Rises (Lush) policy, requiring developers to replace greenery lost on the ground with vertical landscapes. Over 80,000 plants are woven into the tower's fabric, including a soaring four-storey Green Oasis 100m above ground, one of Singapore's highest publicly accessible gardens within a commercial building. CapitaSpring is home to a four-storey Green Oasis garden 100m above ground. ST PHOTO: LIM YAOHUI Ms Yap Lay Bee, co-commissioner of the Singapore Pavilion and URA's group director of Architecture and Urban Design, says that through thoughtful urban planning and design, the agency has created environments that inspire and support how Singaporeans live, work, play and connect. 'In land-scarce Singapore, we need to balance density, diversity and design,' she says. Planning policies, cultural values, environmental priorities and community needs are considered and integrated to create and shape spaces that are inclusive, resilient and adaptable. Ms Yap adds: 'Rasa-Tabula-Singapura offers a sensory map of that approach, inviting visitors to experience the thoughtful processes that have shaped our nation's transformation in the last 60 years. 'It is not just a showcase of what we have built, but also a reflection of how we imagine, and continue to reimagine, our future.' Visitors at the Rasa-Tabula-Singapura exhibition at the Singapore Pavilion at the Arsenale in Venice. PHOTO: GIULIO BOEM As a nation by design, Singapore's socio-economic needs, demographics, policies, and spatial negotiations have guided its urban planning, says Ms Dawn Lim, co-commissioner of the Singapore Pavilion and DSG's executive director. 'Such intelligence not only reflects our design-led development for the last 60 years, but will continue to chart the course for our future,' she adds. 'Centring on the concept of superdiversity, this year's Singapore Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale showcases how the convergence of unique multicultural differences, collective histories, design and new technology offers opportunities for more inclusive, adaptive urban futures.' Prof Khoo says the SUTD team of designers envisioned biennale curator Mr Ratti's theme of intelligence as more than just using artificial intelligence to make an installation. They wanted it to also fete Singapore's collective intelligence as a city. The aim was to show how a city's compactness – once regarded as a weakness, due to living in close quarters – has been turned into its strength. 'Our city is likened to latent space in the world of AI,' says Prof Khoo. Latent space in AI is like a summary that helps computers make sense of complicated data, instead of looking at every tiny detail. This makes it easier to find patterns, understand data and create anew. Prof Khoo adds that latent space captures the essence of the layers of information in a compact way, allowing the decoding of new creative combinations. 'Similarly, our compact city creates a latent space where the essence of various layers of information becomes a source of our creativity and innovation,' he points out. 'This has contributed dramatically to our rapid transformation in just 60 years from a resource-starved nation into a nation with one of the highest gross domestic product per capita and longest life expectancy in the world.' Info: Go to Design Cues is a new column that explores ideas at the intersection of design and art. Designer and lifestyle journalist Chantal Sajan writes on design and architecture. 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Business Mayor
10-05-2025
- General
- Business Mayor
kingdom of bahrain's heatwave pavilion wins venice architecture biennale 2025 golden lion
The Kingdom of Bahrain has been awarded Golden Lion for Best National Participation at the 19th Venice Architecture Biennale for its pavilion, Heatwave. Curated by Andrea Faraguna and commissioned by Shaikh Khalifa bin Ahmed bin Abdullah Al Khalifa of the Bahrain Authority for Culture and Antiquities, the exhibition offers a grounded and urgent response to one of today's most pressing climate challenges: extreme heat. Celebrated for its environmental intelligence and social consideration, Heatwave was praised by this year's International Jury, comprised of Hans Ulrich Obrist (President, Switzerland), Paola Antonelli (Italy), and Mpho Matsipa (South Africa), for its presentation of 'viable proposals for extreme heat conditions,' combining tradition with innovative design. With works by Wafa Al Ghatam, Eman Ali, Alexander Puzrin, and Mario Monotti, Heatwave stands out for its thoughtful integration of traditional Bahraini cooling systems, including wind towers and shaded courtyards, with contemporary material research. The pavilion functions as a full-scale, inhabitable prototype, defined by a raised platform, suspended ceiling, and central supporting column that together depict how passive cooling techniques can be reimagined to address global warming in real-time conditions. Its spatial framework doubles as a climatic device, shaping microclimates through materiality and form. all images by Andrea Avezzù heatwave addresses extreme heat in the nation Designed to be modular and scalable, the Kingdom of Bahrain Pavilion imagines how such systems could be implemented across diverse contexts, particularly in public outdoor spaces where exposure to extreme heat is highest. As the designers explain, 'Architecture must address the dual challenges of environmental resilience and sustainability. The ingenious solution can be deployed in public spaces and in locations where people must live and work outdoors in conditions of extreme heat. The pavilion uses traditional methods of passive cooling typical of the region and reminiscence of wind towers and shaded courtyards.' Read More Budapest Festival Orchestra website design Heatwave also centers the lived experiences of vulnerable outdoor workers, especially those in construction, who work in tough and often extreme climatic conditions, and reframes thermal comfort as a question of equity and public well-being. In doing so, the project introduces the concept of the 'thermal commons' — a shared environmental resource — and advocates for architectural approaches that are porous, adaptive, and communal. Scenarios explored in the pavilion include schoolyards, urban intersections, and other high-heat environments, positioning Heatwave as both a practical proposal and a provocation for rethinking the civic role of architecture in the face of climate emergency. Kingdom of Bahrain awarded Golden Lion for Best National Participation additional accolades at the venice architecture biennale 2025 The International Jury also awarded Special Mentions to the Holy See and Great Britain. The Holy See's Opera aperta, curated by Marina Otero Verzier and Giovanna Zabotti, features work by Tatiana Bilbao Estudio and MAIO Architects, and was recognized for its thoughtful engagement with spatial openness and spiritual reflection. The British Pavilion's Geology of Britannic Repair, curated by Owen Hopkins, Kathryn Yusoff, Kabage Karanja, and Stella Mutegi, brings together collaborators such as cave_bureau and the Palestine Regeneration Team (PART), and was commended for its critical take on colonial and ecological legacies embedded in the British landscape. titled heatwave, the exhibition offers a grounded and urgent response to the challenge of extreme heat. Heatwave stands out for its integration of traditional Bahraini cooling systems with contemporary material research functioning as a full-scale prototype with a raised platform, suspended ceiling, and central supporting column Read More Core77 Weekly Roundup (6-5-23 to 6-9-23) Heatwave centers the lived experiences of vulnerable outdoor workers project info: name: Heatwave curator: Andrea Faraguna exhibitors: Andrea Faraguna, Wafa Al Ghatam, Eman Ali, Alexander Puzrin, Mario Monotti commissioner: S haikh Khalifa bin Ahmed bin Abdullah Al Khalifa, President of Bahrain Authority for Culture and Antiquities program: Venice Architecture Biennale location: Kingdom of Bahrain Pavilion, Arsenale, Venice, Italy
Arab Times
10-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Arab Times
Kuwait showcases cultural vision at Venice Architecture Biennale
PARIS, May 10: Dr. Mohammad Al-Jassar, Secretary General of the National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters (NCCAL), highlighted Kuwait's participation in the 19th Venice Architecture Biennale as a reflection of the nation's contemporary cultural vision. He emphasized the importance of reinterpreting Kuwait's architectural identity as an artistic and cultural medium that mirrors societal transformations. The Kuwait Pavilion, inaugurated on Friday under the patronage of the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC), presents the 'Kaynouna' project. This exhibition, which runs until November 23, showcases the innovative work of young Kuwaiti creators. Their contributions offer a distinctive artistic perspective that transcends traditional styles, enhancing Kuwait's presence in international forums across various disciplines. The pavilion's opening ceremony was attended by Dr. Al-Jassar, Acting Assistant Secretary-General for Antiquities and Museums Mohammed bin Redha, Consul General of the State of Kuwait in Milan and Northern Italy Sheikh Jaber Al-Duaij Al-Sabah, Executive Director of Kuwait Petroleum International in Italy Bashar Al-Awadhi, and representatives from Gulf Cooperation Council countries. Through 'Kaynouna,' the Kuwait Pavilion reimagines architecture as a field of research and exploration. The project employs architecture as a tool to raise questions about identity, history, and material culture. It utilizes experimental drawings, architectural installations, and critical research to move beyond conventional narratives, presenting architecture as a dynamic medium that reflects Kuwait's evolving relationship with its past, present, and future. The pavilion's success is attributed to the efforts of a dedicated Kuwaiti youth team, including Commissioner Abdulaziz Al-Mazidi and Deputy Commissioner Hamad Al-Khulaifi, who played pivotal roles in bringing this distinguished artistic and cultural project to fruition.
Saudi Gazette
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Saudi Gazette
Saudi Arabia to showcase cultural renaissance at 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale
Saudi Gazette report RIYADH — The Saudi Ministry of Culture will host an extensive program of cultural events at the historic Abbazia building in Venice, Italy, from May 10 to November 23, 2025, as part of the Kingdom's official participation in the 19th Venice Architecture Biennale. Through a curated series of exhibitions, panel discussions, and workshops, the initiative will highlight Saudi Arabia's contemporary creative renaissance and cultural diversity, contributing to global conversations on heritage preservation and artistic innovation. The program will spotlight architecture and design, heritage, visual arts, fashion, and culinary arts. A special exhibition titled Rooted Transience, showcasing the winning design of the AlMusalla Prize 2025 — an international design competition organized by the Diriyah Biennale Foundation — will be held on the ground floor of the venue. The upper floor will house a conference hall for cultural programming, as well as a retail space offering Saudi artisanal products and traditional culinary experiences including Saudi coffee and dates. The Ministry emphasized that this initiative forms part of its broader efforts to elevate the Kingdom's cultural presence on international platforms and to introduce global audiences to Saudi Arabia's rich heritage and artistic vitality.
