Page 216 - The 60.Venice Biennial & MoMA issue of WOA Contemporary Art magazine

WORLD-CLASS ART

EMERGING ECOLOGIES:
ARCHITECTURE AND THE RISE
OF ENVIRONMENTALISM

FIRST EXHIBITION FROM THE EMILIO AMBASZ INSTITUTE
FOR THE JOINT STUDY OF THE BUILT AND THE NATURAL
ENVIRONMENT FEATURES OVER 150 WORKS FROM THE 1930S
THROUGH THE 1990S THAT ADDRESS URGENT ECOLOGICAL
AND ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS

The Museum of Modern Art announces Emerging Ecologies:
Architecture and the Rise of Environmentalism, an exhibition
dedicated to both realized and unrealized projects that address
ecological and environmental concerns by architects who
practiced in the United States from the 1930s through the
1990s. In the Museum’s Third Floor North Galleries, Emerging
Emilio Ambasz (Argentine, born 1943). Prefectural International Hall, Fukuoka, Japan.
Ecologies features over 150 works that reconstruct how 1990. Aerial view. 1990. Collection Emilio Ambasz. Photograph: Hiromi Watanabe
the rise of the environmental movement in the US informed
architectural practice and thought. Models, photographs,
Frank Lloyd Wright, while shining a light on many less familiar,
diagrams, and sketches are placed in context with archival
historically significant practices like The New Alchemy Institute,
materials such as posters, flyers, and articles to showcase
Glen Small, and Mária Telkes. Seven newly commissioned
innovative, fantastical, dystopian, and daring architectural
audio recordings that draw inspiration from these little-known
projects that sought to navigate the fraught relationship
projects will feature contemporary practitioners - Mae-ling
between the built and natural environment. The exhibition
Lokko, Jeanne Gang, Meredith Gaglio, Charlotte Malterre-
celebrates the pathbreaking environmentally conscious work
Barthes, Amy Chester, Carolyn Dry, and Emilio Ambasz -
of architects like Emilio Ambasz, Charles and Ray Eames, and
sharing their thoughts on what contemporary architects can
do to mitigate against climate change.
Cambridge Seven Associates (American, est. 1962). Tsuruhama Rain Forest Pavilion,
Osaka, Japan. Project. 1993–95. Section drawing showing the underground levels and
By highlighting projects that both foreshadowed and
the paths at the forest level. 1994–95. Marker and Prismacolor pencil on black-line diazo
print, 20 × 30" (50.8 × 76.2 cm). Collection Cambridge Seven Associates anticipated the ecological effects of overpopulation, the
depletion of natural resources, and rampant industrial
pollution, the exhibition looks to the past to suggest solutions
for the future. Emerging Ecologies:

Architecture and the Rise of Environmentalism is organized
by Carson Chan, Director, the Emilio Ambasz Institute for
the Joint Study of the Built and Natural Environment, and
Curator, Department of Architecture and Design, with Matthew
Wagstaffe and Dewi Tan, Ambasz Institute Research Assistants,
and Eva Lavranou, 12-Month Intern, Ambasz Institute.

216 WORLD of ART