In 2017, Studio L A received the
for their work on inclusive architecture. The jury described them as “a connecting voice that heals the wounds of the past without brushing away the scars”. They praised the socially engaged work of Studio L A, both in design and in word and writing. The award ceremony took place on 10 November 2017, for which we decided to replace the traditional ceremony consisting of a jury report about our work with our own programming through which we opened a conversation about inclusive architecture. We organized a panel discussion with government architect Floris Alkemade, designer Marga Weimans, and mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb of Rotterdam. The discussion was centered on the importance and potential of art in facilitating the conversation around charged topics, and how policies and architecture can respond to segregation in society. In addition, we showed the film
Blinds
+
and used it as a facilitator for a conversation on the current state of refugee housing.
Our interest on how art can form a guide in bringing up charged topics and healthy discussions led us to initiate the exhibition
On Speaking Terms
+
at the Nest art space in the Hague in 2016. Works by artists Yair Callender, Robert Glas, Charl Landvreugd, Barbara Visser and Marga Weimans reflected on us/them dichotomies and xenophobia in society. We designed the exhibition with a forum as the central element, in which people could reflect and debate about the work they had seen in the exhibition. We activated the space in collaboration with Stichting Discussiëren Kun je Leren (Foundation Discussion You Can Learn). Together, we organized dialogue sessions in which children spoke to each other within the forum. We noticed that children are more open towards each other and more accepting towards new ideas.
+
, meaning ‘the grandma of your grandma’. Our participation in the bienial was commissioned by Chief Government Architect Floris Alkemade. Our mission was to focus a project on strengthening the social cohesion that is needed in order to collectively believe in positive change towards a sustainable and shared future. The current discussion about the climate crisis and sustainability is heavily segregated. Sustainable living is in danger of becoming an elite subject, whilst the real consequences and costs of climate change and energy transition often lie with less prosperous citizens. In collaboration with the Discussion Can You Learn Foundation, we put together the educational programme The Grandma of Your Grandma, in which children were encouraged to discuss larger topics through the light question “who was your grandmother’s grandmother?” Through their own family history, boundaries such as “elite” and were brought to light and bridged, while at the same time there is room for discussion about the lifestyles of the past that much more sustainable than contemporary life. As a result, children are able to talk about the way they hope the world will look in the future for their own potential grandchildren. In addition to developing the program within this collaboration, the three-part curriculum took place within a spatial installation by Studio L A that consisted of a large compass which gave a spatial dimension to the positioning of the ancestors from all directions of the wind.
The heard and the spoken word
+
was our graduation project at the Academy of Architecture in Amsterdam. Our project contained a proposal in which the building of the Institute for Human Rights in the Hague really offers room for human rights issues in a new way. In addition, we were imagining it as a place for the public investigation and commemoration of current and historical events that are currently receiving too little attention. We designed a space for debates, conversations and spoken word battles, through which students could bring these topics up. The project was our first step toward the foundation of Studio L A and our interest in researching how public space can be made more active, more public and inclusive and how institutional buildings can actually provide space for the ideas and voices of the different people they serve.