Fertile Spaces – Polish Pavilion Venice Biennale 2018
Competition Project
 
Venice, Italy

Project team: Karolina Szóstkiewicz, Irgen Salianji, Marina Kounavi, Harris Vamvakas

 

Project Description:

Poland is a country with a vast amount of natural resources and a long tradition connected with their exploitation. The most archaic and labour intense of them, agriculture constitutes the foundations of our food chain and cultural evolution. Out of all agricultural operations, the process of harvesting is the one that has inspired the most rituals and created a collective imaginary across the centuries. Harvesting marks the end of the growing season and celebrates the success of the production process, provides the satisfaction of collecting the crops and initiates the processing of them into food products such as flour and bread.

The end of harvest, which is traditionally on or around August 15th, has been followed by numerous polish festivals and customs, as it is a collective effort and brings together families and villagers. Traditionally, among many customs, a crown of straw was placed on the head of a village girl and the mayor of the village then placed a rooster on top of the crown. It is said that, as the girl led the way from the fields with musicians and villagers, if the rooster crowed it was considered good luck and the future would be good, if the rooster refused to eat it was looked upon as a bad omen and prospects for a good winter were bleak. In other occasions, a nobleman would receive a wreath of wheat and rye, bedecked with flowers, fruits and ribbons. The girl who reaps the most would be present a symbolic gift to the nobleman while singing ‘’The fruits of the harvest we bring to the master’s home’’. The presentation of the wreath of grain was followed by feasting and merrymaking.

Straw is one of the end products of the process of harvest. Even though it is formally a waste, straw is a very useful product and an archaic material used in a multiplicity of ways, including the construction sector. The use of straw bales in the construction of the pavilion’s interior suggests a cheap and primitive way to produce space that feels warm and informal to use in a wide range of unpredictable ways. Creating a contemporary spatial experience by employing the archaic practice of piling straw bales, the pavilion brings together the customs of Poland and the overall theme of the Biennale. Natural light and a sound installation are the two other elements that enrich the exhibition, which is in fact an ongoing research materialized into a 1:1 installation of Freespace. Natural light, provided by the large skylights of the pavilion, illuminates the Freespace of the piled straw bales and all together provide a generous context for visitors to explore, imagine and activate the interior of the pavilion.

The interior of the pavilion is filled with straw bales which are arranged in such a way to create a set of un-programmed spaces for visitors to inhabit and activate in unexpected ways. Visitors can stand, sit or lay on the soft surfaces of the straw bales, they can move them around and rearrange the space according to their creative drive and the needs of everyday social encounters. The pavilion is therefore transformed, for the very first time, into an interactive exhibit of its own– it performs as a three dimensional spatial experience and not merely as an empty white box. The pavilion’s interior as the exhibit itself.

Complementary to the installation of the straw bales, there will be an artistic sound installation and a series of abstract models that present both Polish cultural elements and the value of Freespace in contemporary architecture. The sound installation will be commissioned to an independent contemporary artist and can act as the fourth dimension to the Pavilion’s interior concept. It can capture sounds from the Polish countryside, the harvest machines or/and interviews with villagers that work in the fields. It could even create a contrast by presenting the impressions of city dwellers when visiting the fields and getting exposed to the liberating feeling of the empty fields and the smells of the process of harvesting.

A series of architectural models showcasing the qualities of Freespace in contemporary architecture could bring a hands-on element to the primitiveness of the installation. The models could be commissioned to several Polish architects and showcase the importance of un-programmed empty space in architecture. Their creation could even be an active process throughout the duration of the Biennale, with visitors or students being asked to intervene and modify them or create new ones according to their wishes.

In line with Biennale’s overall theme, the Polish pavilion becomes a 1:1 prototype of Freespace. It performs as a space of opportunities, since every corner of it is designed to facilitate spontaneous and creative use. It feeds visitor’s imagination as it is unfinished, subject of constant change and multifunctional in its use and appropriation. It addresses the unspoken wishes of the strangers by providing an infinite range of possible arrangements that can offer either intense activity or relaxation for the visitors. It highlights nature’s gifts of fertility that enables the development of life and civilization (soil-water-sunlight), and uses the products of harvesting as the base construction material to generate space and vibrant human experiences.

It strengthens our relationship with time and memory by producing contemporary spatial qualities with the archaic possibilities of the straw bale. It reveals the cultural layers of Polish and European modernization by retelling the evolutionary story of the ancient practice of harvesting and its importance to our collective metabolism and survival.




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