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13.11.24
25.10.24
Irish film premieres, four exhibitions and a range of talks and events extend our the season of architecture events to 1 December!
From 24 October, the Irish Architecture Foundation is proud to present to public audiences three new exhibitions: A Lot With Little, BenchMark, and On Rest. These join a fourth exhibition already installed, The Reason of Towns, an exhibition with Valerie Mulvin, which together anchor This Is Where We Are Now, a season of architecture events examining the state of our place with exhibitions, films, symposia, and talks proudly presented by the IAF.
All exhibitions are open to audiences for free for five weeks from 24 October – 1 December at our temporary venue at Charlemont Walk, D2.
As well as these four exhibitions, This Is Where We Are Now is supported by a range of talks, conversations and symposia which elaborate on themes raised in the exhibitions, such as placemaking, public space, housing, the future of the Irish town, and more.
All exhibitions are free to visit on a drop-in basis during opening hours – no need to book a ticket.
All events are pre-book through the IAF’s Eventbrite page.
Opening hours: Wednesdays-Sundays, 11am-5pm
Location: 1 Charlemont Walk, Dublin 2 (map)
The venue is served by the Luas Green Line and several buses:
Accessibility: Ground floor, fully accessible via ramps on entry. Accessible toilets are located at the Charlemont Square Concierge building.
An Irish premiere screening, A Lot With Little showcases the work of international architects engaged in sustainable solutions for housing, education, transformation of existing buildings and disaster relief. It features projects with a social dimension that have had a positive impact on the communities they serve. The contributing architects provide multiple interpretations of a common mindset, overcoming a lack of resources with creative ingenuity.
An immersive film installation, curated and produced by Noemí Blager and made by Tapio Snellman, showcases selected projects in their existing settings, alongside interviews with the architects themselves.
The featured architects embrace lateral thinking and participatory methods, leading to the creation of sustainable, affordable architecture that contributes to societal betterment. Their shared values prioritise context over concept, fostering flexible, people-centered architecture that exist in harmony with their surroundings. Here, sustainability isn’t a mere goal or regulatory response — it’s a natural consequence of their design philosophy.
Featured architects include:
Mariam Issoufou, Mariam Issoufou Architects, Niger with united④design
Anne Lacaton & Jean Philippe Vassal, Lacaton & Vassal, France
Mauricio Rocha, Taller de Arquitectura Mauricio Rocha, Mexico
Marina Tabassum, MTA, Bangladesh
Jan de Vylder & Inge Vinck, A JDVIV, Belgium
Francis Kéré, Kéré Architecture, Burkina Faso/ Germany
Solano Benitez, Jopoi de Arquitectura, Paraguay
Marta Maccaglia, Semillas, Peru
Shigeru Ban, Voluntary Architect’s Network, Japan
Marta Peris & Jose Toral, Peris + Toral Architects, Spain
The exhibition is curated and produced by Noemí Blager. The film is made by Tapio Snellman and the music composed by Daniel Nolan.
Installation in Dublin is by SpaceForms.
BenchMark is a new work by architecture and design collective Rubble. The work is commissioned by the Irish Architecture Foundation under our gaplab graduate architecture programme.
The bench presented in Charlemont Walk is a nomadic bench which facilitated a series of impromptu interviews about Dublin’s public spaces during the Open House Dublin festival of architecture. Designed to be easily transported, the bench was built using fragments of Carrara marble and salvaged metal scraps. A provocative and political project and proposal by this emerging group, the project invites conversation and debate about the possibility of social infrastructure provision in our cities, noting that if so much happens in the absence of characterful, situated, or even basic infrastructure such as benches, what could be possible if the public are supported in their inhabitation of our shared spaces?
Rubble are Dominic Daly, Maria Daly, Nicolas Howden, David Hurley and Emily Jones.
This photographic series, made by Dominic Daly, documents the behaviour of the human body searching for respite along one of Dublin’s busiest thoroughfares: O’Connell Street. On Rest observes how people interact with a street without seats; appearing to never stop in open space, and instead gravitating towards some sort of spatial anchor – a ledge, niche, lid, or face, against which they can rest their body.
Taken entirely over the course of two hours and set within a 200m section of O’Connell Street in 2022 as lockdown was lifted, these photographs were taken without aim, simply as an open-ended study of human behaviour in public space, capturing people as they re-appropriated the street clutter to suit their needs, each in very distinct, often unusual ways.
Displayed hanging from rented scaffold props, construction infrastructure ubiquitous with the city and its streets, and arranged in a dense crowd, the work presents the human alongside the language of the construction industry and poses the question: who is going to build the city we see for ourselves?
Making its first and only scheduled stop in Dublin, The Reason of Towns, an exhibition with architect Valerie Mulvin, is based on thirty years of work on the subject by one of Ireland’s most respected architects. While on tour across Ireland in 2024 the exhibition has prompted local debate and discussion on history, heritage and how towns can be sustained into the future as viable places to live into the next century. Curated and produced by the Irish Architecture Foundation, the exhibition is beautifully designed by AP+E (Laurence Lord, Jeffrey Bolhuis) and boasts three new film works: The Space is The Thing, Of Pride of Place, and a new interview between Valerie Mulvin and broadcaster Vincent Woods.
The Irish Architecture Foundation is principally funded by the Arts Council, the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, and the Office of Public Works and Dublin City Council. A full list of our funders can be found here.
The Reason of Towns exhibition is funded by the Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon and the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. The exhibition tour is additionally funded by the Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon. The Talks of the Towns programme is funded by the Department of Rural and Community Development and the Government of Ireland.
This Is Where We Are Now is presented with the support of McGarrell Reilly and our funders. The housing exhibitions and talks are supported by The Housing Agency.
Photo: A Lot With Little at This Is Where We Are Now, November 2024. Photo by Ste Murray.
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