As Dublin awaits the 19th edition of Open House Dublin, Ireland’s largest festival of architecture, the Irish Architecture Foundation (IAF) is proud to additionally confirm that Open House Dublin will anchor This Is Where We Are Now, an unprecedented new season of reflections, conversations and international exhibitions on architecture, towns, the city and the state of our place.
Presented by the IAF to mark our residency of a new temporary architecture venue on Charlemont Walk, Dublin 2, This Is Where We Are Now sustains a core ambition of Open House Dublin to give more people more access to more architecture.
Beginning with Open House Dublin on 12 October and running until 1 December, This Is Where Are Now empowers visitors to explore and enjoy new national and international exhibitions on architecture with some of the world’s most celebrated architects; join expert-led conversations on critical issues confronting Dublin and Ireland such as housing and health; participate in placemaking workshops with poets, performers and artists; and hear from and see new work by the future leaders of architecture and design in Ireland.
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Open House events as part of This Is Where We Are Now at Charlemont Walk
With many festival events happening at the Charlemont Walk venue, this year’s Open House Dublin will start with a dedicated Open House Junior weekend for children and families on 12-13 October, with the main programme of events, including tours of buildings, outdoor spaces and residences taking place from 18-20 October. In between, the Open Table conversations series is returning and these will take place daily from 14-18 October at this year’s festival info hub at Charlemont Walk, in Dublin 2.
Key events as part of This Is Where We Are Now at Charlemont Walk
Key exhibition and film highlights include:
- The Reason of Towns, an exhibition with architect Valerie Mulvin
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.
- A Lot With Little
The IAF is proud to present for the first time in Ireland the international touring film-triptych, A Lot With Little. Showcasing the work of international architects from the Global North and the Global South, engaged in sustainable solutions for housing, education, transformation of existing buildings and disaster relief, A Lot With Little features projects with a social dimension that have had a positive impact on the community. The contributing architects, including Pritzker Prize winners, provide multiple interpretations of a common mindset, overcoming a lack of resources with creative ingenuity. Featured architects include Mariam Issoufou, Niger; 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 Architects Network, Japan.
- On the occasion of the IAF showing A Lot with Little in Dublin, and in partnership with the Design and Crafts Council of Ireland, the IAF is thrilled to present one of the stars of the film, architect Mariam Issoufou in conversation with Lesley Lokko, OBE, on 11 November at the Royal Irish Academy of Music, Dublin.
- Bí Linn, an Aisteach exhibition
This exhibition presents the ongoing work of Aisteach, engaging with notions of queer housing and domesticity. The group will present their community work in Ireland, individual artistic and architectural pursuits and research, and international case studies which present alternative housing arrangements and economic development models not currently widely represented in Ireland.
- Squashed Living
This provocative exhibition by young architects Peter O’ Grady and Laura Flynn opens windows into how others live, documenting diverse living situations across Dublin and beyond. From young professionals to direct provision, the exhibition confronts the visitor with the ‘state of the nation’ when it comes to the range of ways people experience housing in Ireland today. Using photographs, survey drawings and invited lived experience interviews and written contributions, this exhibition will be sure to prompt debate and discussion on housing in Ireland.
Key talks and conversation highlights include:
- Talks of the Town
Having taken place in Birr, Belmullet and Trim as part of the tour of The Reason of Towns, the final Talks of the Town for 2024 takes place in Dublin. A summit of towns from around the city of Dublin, this unique one-day event will focus on the reciprocal nature of towns to the city core and vice versa.
- gaplab Sessions ’24
For the first time members of the Irish Architecture Foundation’s young architect programme, gaplab, will meet with peers and mentors to discuss and advance the critical practice of architecture. Hosting talks, events and specific workshops, the 2024 cohort of gaplab will use the occasion of This Is Where We Are Now to speculate and reimagine the future of risk, work and creativity in architecture. Additionally, some members of gaplab will present new exhibitions, including BenchMark, designs for a new bench for the city of Dublin and On Rest, a photographic study on the lack of seating provision on Dublin’s main street.
- A Place Belongs Forever To
In this series of new participatory conversations, led by the IAF’s Reimagine placemaking team, poetry, activism and performance are brought to the table to expand and deepen knowledge and experience of how people make places, adopt and adapt them and how belonging to a place might be more real, profound and deeply felt.
- The Housing Dialogues
One of Ireland’s greatest challenges, housing, will be discussed across a series of in-person events, prompted by the exhibition programme. Led by young people, emerging architects, housing experts and more, this short season of talks on housing will be engaging and provocative in expanding our understanding of the challenges we face and the imaginative solutions architecture and design thinking might offer.
Announcing This Is Where We Are Now, Emmett Scanlon, Director of the Irish Architecture Foundation, said: “The Irish Architecture Foundation has been welcoming people to our events, workshops, talks and exhibitions on and about architecture and the built environment for almost two decades. It gives me and the entire IAF team great pleasure to afford people more opportunity to explore and engage with architecture this season at This Is Where We Are Now in our temporary venue at Charlemont Walk, Dublin. Time and again people express to us their desire and appetite to have somewhere to go to know more about the built world. We have assembled a diverse programme which demonstrates the brilliance and beauty of the architectural imagination, supports audiences to discuss challenging issues such as housing and climate change, and offers people a place to linger and be part of a growing community of interest in architecture and the built world. We invite people to come down to the venue and get involved in the discussion about where we are now in Ireland.”
Photos:
- This Is Where We Are Now exhibition space on Charlemont Walk, Dublin 2.
- Talks of the Town at The Reason of Towns in John’s Hall, Birr. Photo by Ste Murray.
- Still from A Lot With Little films © Noemí Blager and Tapio Snellman – Niamey 2000, housing project, Niamey, Niger. Architects united4design.
- On Rest photo by Dominic Daly.
