Void // Space
Stern Jul
Joseph Mai
Körner Robert
We are four young students from three different universities and three different nationalities who form an international collective. As we are all interested in learning an alternative way of thinking about space, we spontaneously gathered together and started spatial experiments.
Mai Joseph and Robert Körner previously researched and worked in the field of urbanism with a focus on in-between spaces and neglected spaces (Master thesis - Symposium Delft / Spatial Justice). Jul Stern developed guerrilla tactics for landscape urbanism. Johannes Zanton has a background in experimental architecture and spatial interventions.
In particular interested in the neglected spaces in the city and the contemporary theories around it (Third Landscape, Gilles Clement). These spaces are above all „islands“ in cultural, material and political terms and represent an ideological and practical challenge for the city, the profession and the population. The ‘intrinsic value’ of the supposedly useless is in many parts of society neglected or not accepted.
To learn from and understand how to mediate these spaces, we planned our first research activity to rethink the academic approach in a hands-on experience. A short time frame in which conceptualization and learning were closely related.
In the context of Sarajevo this topic finds relevance. Due to rigid building rules inside the vast heritage zone around the city center and a difficult political background, thinking and doing architecture gets partially frozen. Then the urban voids appear as an opportunity and a place of liberty.
Within a five-day frame, we experimented in a neglected space, how to enhance its architectural potential and its social and cultural value. Our main concern is now how to transmit these abstract ideas of freedom and spatial qualities, without depriving them of their characteristic, indeterminate and free nature.
Our first attempt was to represent our ephemeral interventions through photography and film. Conscious of our outsider view and desire to leave the purely architectural sphere, we wanted to address the cultural and social context in which the voids are embedded.
Our current work is to implement a spatial structure that allows access to the neglected voids in the city and can be adapted to the different topographic situations of Sarajevo. A platform that, like an insect, inhabits the urban voids of the city. Its materiality reflects the environment in some places and is translucent in others. Following this idea, we want to work with local actors in the next step to turn these urban voids into places of rituals.