Exhibit dedicated to Hip-Hop Architecture opens next month at the Center for Architecture
Proposal for JXTA Arts Center, 4RM+ULA
The emerging movement of Hip-Hop Architecture will be highlighted in an exhibit for the first time, the Center for Architecture announced last week. The exhibit, Close to the Edge: The Birth of Hip-Hop Architecture, will feature the work of 21 practitioners, academics and students, curated by Sekou Cooke of the Syracuse University School of Architecture. According to the center, “hip-hop’s primary means of expression—deejaying, emceeing, b-boying, and graffiti—have become globally recognized creative practices, and each has significantly impacted the urban built environment.” It opens on the first day of Archtober 2018, Monday, Oct. 1.
In the main gallery, graffiti artist David CHINO Villorente will design full-scale murals and tags on the interior walls. Next, a 40-foot shipping container will be repurposed and sliced into sections to be hung on the walls, partially covering the graffiti below. WeShouldDoItAll (WSDIA) is handling the exhibit’s graphic design.
The shipping containers, Cooke explained, represent the creative reuse and appropriation for architects over the last several years. “Since repurposing, sampling and appropriations are dominant themes within hip-hop, many Hip-Hop Architecture projects use them as a starting point,” he said.
The show features vinyl lettering, paint-pen tags and arrows (designed by CHINO), wheat-pasted posters, and name tag stickers. The only color used in the show is in the form of a grid of framed images and drawings; everything else remains black, white, or gray. At the end of the gallery, a multi-screen video collage of lectures, music videos, and other footage will be shown.
On the lower level, the exhibit continues with 3D printed models of blank formal objects without contexts, a series of images about movements related to Hip-Hop Architecture, and an audio booth with clips taken from lectures and interviews.
“Hip-Hop Architecture is as hard to pin down as it is vibrantly challenging and relevant to consider,” Barry Bergdoll, president of the Center for Architecture and Hon. AIANY, said. “The assembly of practices brought together here could not be more timely in directing energy towards conversations we urgently need to advance.”
The exhibit will open on the first day of Archtober on October 1, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Close to the Edge will run until January 2019. Learn more here.
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