This talk was the Opening Keynote Lecture (Fondazione Giangiacomo Feltrinelli on October 20, h.18.00) at the Symposium Southern Europe and Beyond. Comparative and Multi-Situated Perspectives on Middle-class Housing held in Milan from October 20 to 23 and organized by Gaia Caramellino, Nicole De Togni, Federico Zanfi, DAStU – Politecnico di Milano in the framework of the COST Action European-funded MCMH-EU CA18137, “European Middle-Class Mass Housing”.
Organizers
Gaia Caramellino, Nicole De Togni, Federico Zanfi , DAStU_Politecnico di Milano
Konstantina Kalfa is Research Associate at the History and Theory of Architecture Laboratory, NTUA. Her current research revolves around the study of architecture in the realm of postwar modernization and development, with a particular focus on informal housing practices and how these are intertwined with multiple types of politics and social conflicts. Her articles on housing and architecture’s political economy and production mechanisms have appeared in the Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, ABE Journal, Architecture and Culture, Rethinking Marxism and The Aggregate Architectural History Collaborative’s Architecture in Development: Systems and the Emergence of the Global South (Routledge 2022). In 2019 she authored the book Self-sheltering Now! The Invisible Side of American Aid to Greece [in Greek] (Athens: Futura).
We are glad to announce the “second season” of “MCMH-EU series. This new season is composed of four talks and will be released every Wednesday at 15h00 (CET).
The talks are part of the lecture series “Writing the History of Post-war Housing Complexes and Neighborhoods. A Take on Research Strategies and Methodologies”, organized by Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri in the framework of the COST Action European-funded MCMH-EU CA18137, “European Middle-Class Mass Housing” and of the Phd Program in Architecture: History and Design (Politecnico di Torino).
The talk challenges the common view that exhibitions are primary research outcomes to disseminate findings with by demonstrating their untapped potential as methodological tools to produce new forms of democratic, participatory knowledge that starts long before, and that may continue after the end of a show. The lecture explores this innovative model of exhibitions by drawing on the exhibition ‘At Home in Japan’, that I. Daniels curated at the Geffrye Museum in London in 2011, as well as the project “Disobedient Buildings” that Daniels designed around a major exhibition about aging housing, welfare and wellbeing in the UK, Romania and Norway (www.disobedientbuildings.com).
Inge Daniels is an Associate Professor in Social Anthropology at the University of Oxford. Her research interests include housing, atmosphere and the built environment. She has conducted several long-term ethnographies inside homes in Japan culminating in her 2010 monograph ‘The Japanese House’. I. Daniels also has an ongoing interest in curation and exhibitions. She has curated an exhibition at the British Museum (2001) and her recent book What are exhibitions for? (2019) is based on an ethnography of visitors to her 2012 exhibition at the Geffrye Museum in London.
VIDEO AUTHOR(S):Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri
FILMMAKER CREDITS: Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri- Microsoft Teams virtual class
RECORDING LOCATION: WEDNESDAY, 30 SEPTEMBER 2020, 15H00 – Microsoft Teams virtual class
VIDEO PARTICIPANTS & EXPERTS: Inge Daniels , Gaia Caramellino
YAEL ALLWEIL
Head of HousingLab: History and Future of Living, Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning, Technion IIT Israel
«Housing as a Research Question and as a Field in the Architectural History of Israel-Palestine: The Pivotal Case Method»
Yael Allweil is Assistant Professor and Head of the “HousingLab: History and Future of Living” at the Faculty of Architecture and Town Planning, Technion IIT Israel. Her research explores the history of housing in Israel and Palestine and the history of struggles over urban public spaces and her work involves academic research and activism in the context of the Israeli housing social movement. She is the author of Home-Land: Zionism as Housing Regime 1860-2011 (Routledge, 2016).
VIDEO AUTHOR(S):Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri
FILMMAKER CREDITS: Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri- Microsoft Teams virtual class
RECORDING LOCATION: WEDNESDAY, 23 SEPTEMBER 2020, 15H00 (CET)
VIDEO PARTICIPANTS & EXPERTS: YAEL ALLWEIL
SANDRA PARVU
ENSA Paris-Val de Seine/LAA_Laboratorie Architecture Anthropologie
«A COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN. The Recent Past and the Question of Sources in Writing the History of Post-war Housing in France.»
Sandra Parvu is an architect, a faculty member at the Paris-Val de Seine National Architecture School, and a research fellow at the Architecture and Anthropology Lab. Her book Grands ensembles en situation. Journal de bord de quatre chantiers (MetisPresses, 2011) explores the dialogue between political motivation and aesthetic research in the construction of postwar housing in France.
VIDEO AUTHOR(S):Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri
FILMMAKER CREDITS: Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri- Microsoft Teams virtual class
RECORDING LOCATION: WEDNESDAY, 16 SEPTEMBER 2020, 15H00 (CET)
VIDEO PARTICIPANTS & EXPERTS: Sandra Parvu
MILES GLENDINNING
Scottish Centre for Conservation Studies/University of Edinburgh
«MASS HOUSING – A GLOBAL HISTORY Themes, Methodologies, Spin-Offs»
Miles Glendinning is the Director of the Scottish Centre for Conservation Studies and Professor of Architectural Conservation at the University of Edinburgh. He has published extensively on modernist and contemporary architecture and housing, conservation and Scottish architecture; his books include the award-winning Tower Block (with Stefan Muthesius) and The Conservation Movement. His current research is focused on the international history of mass housing, with planned books including a forthcoming global history (Mass Housing) and a history of public housing in Hong Kong.
VIDEO AUTHOR(S):Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri
FILMMAKER CREDITS: Gaia Caramellino and Filippo De Pieri- Microsoft Teams virtual class
RECORDING LOCATION: WEDNESDAY, 9 SEPTEMBER 2020, 15H00 (CET)
VIDEO PARTICIPANTS & EXPERTS: Miles Glendinning
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