16.04.2016
Post-Highway
Old Utopias for a New World
The Kleinpolderplein-junction was completed in 1972 as the first four-storey flyover of Europe. Built as the ultimate modern project and a motor of Rotterdam’s reconstruction economy, it is now mostly seen as a source of pollution and fragmentation. What are the ideas and dreams embedded in the development of the post-war highway and its establishment as an icon of modernity? Which politics underpin them? And can new infra-utopias replace the old ones? With our feet on the temporarily emptied asphalt of the highway and our faces towards the skyline of Rotterdam, Space Invaders #1 discusses the historical foundations and possible futures of the highway.
Participants
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Wouter Vanstiphout
Wouter Vanstiphout is an architectural historian, founding member of Crimson Architectural Historians and co-founder of the Independent School for the City. He has written extensively on urbanism, specializing in the urban renewal of post-war cities. From 2012 until 2016 he was a member of the national advisory council on the environment and infrastructure.
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Mark Pimlott
Mark Pimlott is an artist, designer, writer and teacher whose practice encompasses installation, photography, film, art for public spaces and interior design. He has taught architecture and visual arts since 1986 and is currently assistant professor at the Chair of Interiors Buildings Cities (Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment, TU Delft).
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Sereh Mandias
Sereh Mandias studied Architecture at the TU Delft and Philosophy at the Erasmus University Rotterdam. In her work she oscillates between theory and praxis, with a specific interest in the creation of the contemporary city. She works as an independent writer and researcher, is the founder of architecture podcast Windoog, editor of Journal for Architecture OASE and teaches at the Chair of Interiors Buildings Cities (Faculty of Architecture and the built Environment, TU Delft) and the Rotterdam Academy of Architecture.
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Thijs Barendse
Thijs Barendse is an independent programme-maker and the director of De Dépendance. He worked for three years at De Unie, the former venue for debate and dialogue in Rotterdam. Since 2012 he also works as chief-editor of the monthly Rotterdam Late Night talkshow, as secretary of the Pierre Bayle Prize for Art Criticism, and as a board member of WORM, Institute for Avantgardistic Recreation.