The presence of Waterloo Architecture in Venice over the past decade is remarkable: in five consecutive instances, Waterloo Architecture’s faculty and graduates have been selected to represent Canada at the most prestigious international exhibition of architecture. Over 200,000 visitors make their way to la Biennale di Venezia where every even year, architecture is celebrated in the Arsenale and Giardini of the city of Venice, Italy.
Selected from Waterloo exhibits and projects shown at the past five Architectural Biennales plus one intervention into the 2015 Art Biennale, the work assembled at Design at Riverside testifies to the breadth and critical depth of research the School of Architecture fosters. Rich with prototypes, tests, photographs but also shipping plans, Waterloo Architecture in Venice offers a glimpse into what it means to research, plan, build, ship and install an architectural exhibition some thousands of kilometers away, from the shore of the Grand River to the Venetian Lagoon.
The five architecture exhibitions included are:
2008: 41° – 66° Architecture in Canada: Region, Culture, Tectonics by John McMinn + Marco Polo
2010: The Hylozoic Ground by Philip Beesley
2012: Migrating Landscapes by 5468796 Architecture Inc., including contributions by Marianna de Cola, Liana Bresler, Batay Csorba Studio
2014: Arctic Adaptions by Lateral Office (Lola Sheppard + Mason White)
2016:
The
Evidence
Room
by
Robert
Jan
van
Pelt
with
Anne
Bordeleau,
Donald
McKay
+
Sascha
Hastings
plus
one
intervention
in
the
art
biennale:
2015: Migrant Choir: Inno Delle Nazioni by Public Studio (Elle Flanders, Tamira Sawatzky) + Adrian Blackwell