Según el arquitecto Peter Eisenman, Rem Koolhaas ha utilizado la bienal para anunciar el fin de su "hegemonía" sobre la profesión. (?)
"Está declarando su fin", comentó Eisenman, y agregó: "Rem Koolhaas presenta la Bienal como la fine [final]:" El final de mi carrera, al final de mi hegemonía, el final de mi mitología, el fin de todo, el final de la arquitectura".
El arquitecto estadounidense a sus 81 años de edad, dijo que Koolhaas, de 70 años, era "la figura totémica" de los últimos 50 años y lo comparó con el dominio de Le Corbusier de la primera mitad del siglo XX. Eisenman hizo los comentarios en Venecia el viernes, donde asistía a la inauguración de un evento colateral de la exposición sobre el Proyecto de Yenikapi, un nuevo y vasto desarrollo en Estambul que diseñó en colaboración con Aytac Arquitectos.
Peter Eisenman ironicamente dijo: "Creo que es muy importante haber vivido en la época de Rem, como haber vivido en la época de Corbusier", recordando el día en que apareció a las afueras de París en el taller de Le Corbusier en 1962, donde se sentía demasiado intimidado para tocar el timbre: "Creo que los estudiantes de hoy sienten lo mismo acerca de la mitología de Koolhaas."
Eisenman dijo que el espectáculo Elements era como lengua sin gramática: "Cualquier lengua es gramática", dijo. "Así que, si la arquitectura se considera una lengua," los elementos no importan. Así que para mí lo que falta [en la muestra], intencionadamente olvidada, es la gramática".
Koolhaas "no cree en la gramática", agregó.
Dando un paseo por la feria la semana pasada, dijo que esperaba que los Elementos de Koolhaas conducirían a "una modernización del núcleo de la arquitectura y el propio pensamiento arquitectónico."
Eisenman, director de Eisenman Architects, conoció a Koolhaas desde los años 70, cuando el arquitecto holandés estudió en el Instituto de Eisenman de Arquitectura y Estudios Urbanos (IAUS) en Nueva York.
"Ayudé a publicar su primer libro," dijo Eisenman. "di el dinero para publicar Delirious New York, yo estaba en el jurado que le otorgó el primer premio ganado por su arquitectura. Le di una oficina donde escribir Delirious New York, así que conozco a Rem desde el principio."
A continuación una transcripción de la entrevista en inglés.-
Valentina Ciuffi: Let's talk about Elements [the exhibition occupying the Central Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale]. You've known Rem from the very beginning – what do you think of the core show at his biennale?
Peter Eisenman: First of all, any language is grammar. The thing that changes from Italian to English is not the words being different, but grammar. So, if architecture is to be considered a language, 'elements' don't matter. I mean, whatever the words are, they're all the same. So for me what's missing [from the show], purposely missing, is the grammatic.
Look, 50 years ago, we knew that Modernism was dead. Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, Frank Lloyd Wright: all dead. We didn't know what the future was but we knew all this was dead.
In '68 we found out what the future was going to be: the revolution in '68 in the schools, in culture, in art etc: all was changed. We are now 50 years from '64 and the totemic figure of these 50 years, the symbolic figure? Rem Koolhaas, right?
Rem Koolhaas presents the Biennale as la fine [the end]: "The end of my career, the end of my hegemony, the end of my mythology, the end of everything, the end of architecture." Because we don't have architects [in the biennale]. We have performance, we have film, we have video; we have everything but architecture.
So Rem is saying: "You know, I want to say: I don't do this, I don't do this, I don't do this, but I also want to tell you that I don't want you to tell me my end. I'm telling you the end." He makes the point, bonk, like that.
Valentina Ciuffi: He's stating his end?
Peter Eisenman: He's stating his end. And he's finished. And we don't know what's coming in four five years. 2018, like 1968, could be a revolution. Who knows?
Valentina Ciuffi: So this end is the start of something new?
Peter Eisenman: Always. History always goes like this.
Valentina Ciuffi: But when he says no to archistars, yes to architecture…
Peter Eisenman: He is the archistar! He is the origin of the archistar. He was there at the beginning.
Valentina Ciuffi: You taught all the archistars. They all came from your academy [the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies in New York].
Peter Eisenman: He is the archistar and now he is the curator star. He's killed all the archistars, and now he is going [to be the] single curator star.
Valentina Ciuffi: You are one of the few people able to be so straight with him because…
Peter Eisenman: I know him very well. We started together way back. I helped publish his first book. I got the money to publish Delirious New York, I was on the jury that gave him the first prize he ever won for his architecture. I gave him an office where to write Delirious New York, so I know Rem from the beginning.
Valentina Ciuffi: So you think this idea of taking elements and not thinking about the grammar is totally…
Peter Eisenman: Well it's Rem. It's Rem because he doesn't believe in grammar. That's Rem, and that's good. Look, when he was at the Architecture Association School in 1972, in the spring of '72 when he quit – because he never finish school, you have to understand – because he went to the new director and he said, quote: "I want to learn fundamentals. Where can I learn fundamentals?"
And the director looked at him and said: "We don't teach fundamentals here. We teach language." And then he quit. So there is a relationship between quitting the school in 1972 and Fundamentals today. Okay?
Valentina Ciuffi: You are perhaps one of the the few people who can be so direct about Rem.
Peter Eisenman: I love Rem. I think it's very important to have lived in the time of Rem, like to have lived in the time of Corbusier. In '62 I went to Paris and I stood on the doorstep of Le Corbusier's atelier at 35 rue de Sèvres with my mentor Colin Rowe. He said, "Ring the doorbell!" And I said: "What I'm going to say to this guy? What am I doing here?"
And I think that students today feel the same way about the mythology of Koolhaas: "What am I going to say to him?" So very few people would challenge him. If you ask him questions; yesterday at the press conference people were asking him questions and he said: "I don't answer questions like this. You should stop asking questions."
So he's a very, very clear and a good person to put this biennale on. And sarà la fine dell'architecttura [it will be the end of architecture].
