romanian pavilion at venice architecture biennale 2010

‘1:1’, the romanian pavilion, at the 12th international architecture biennale in venice, italy image © designboom

‘1:1’, this this year’s official romanian pavilion at la biennale di venezia explores the very essence of space by designing an inhabitable object that defines–almost violently–two different worlds: the first being the communal, exterior, profane, public, tense, dense, and real; the second, having characteristics of the individual, interior, sacral, private, calm, rarefied, and abstract.

(left and right) exterior shots images © designboom

the pavilion is a room within a room: a subtly skewed box dominates the interior of the exhibition space, constructed out of panels of wood and washed, both inside and out, with white paint. with a surface area of exactly 94.443 m2, this abstract object represents the demographic density in the city of bucharest and illustrates both the situation of the individual and a collective state. the structure can be entered, one by one, through a door on one side. the interior lacks any form of opening with the exception of two small puncture holes on either ends and a larger disc form carved out of the ceiling. upon entering, the individual experiences a space that is controlled and profoundly personal.

interior view image © designboom

the second word–the exterior–is circumscribed by the space between the built object and the room. this narrow chasm, shared by all the visitors of the pavilion at once, defines a space which is variable, dynamic, disquieting, and chaotic. by traversing this area before entering the structure, there is tension and communication between the two worlds through the three apertures.

‘1:1’ aims to highlight the importance of architecture as a generator of space by re-establishing the notion of a direct link between the individual, space and architecture.

visitor experiencing the interior, observed through one of the aperture on the side wall images © designboom

interior view image © designboom

the two small holes on either end of the structure image © designboom

looking up through the ceiling aperture image © designboom

diagram and dimension of exhibition

(top left) the city, bucharest – the area, 215 987 000 m2 (top right) the collective – population, 2 288 000 (bottom left) the individual – density, 94.4 m2 / person (bottom right) exhibiting the space – scale, 1:1

(left and right) images of the model

construction shots image courtesy 1:1 team

full credits:

general commissioner: monica morariu, ministry of culture and national heritage, romania deputy commssioner: alexndru damian, ioan lucacel curator: tudor vlasceanu project team: romina grillo, ciprian rasoiu, liviu vasiu, matei vlasceanu, tudor vlasceanu illustrations: dan perjovschi structure: dragos marcu construction: art-deco, atelier rd