venice biennale 2012: revisit by the republic of cyprus

‘revisit – customizing tourism’ by the republic of cyprus at the venice biennale image © designboom

venice  2012 architecture biennale: day three – live!

the republic of cyprus has created ‘revisit – customizing tourism’ within the arsenale, one of two venues comprising the 13th international architecture exhibition in venice. visitors experience the republic’s island tourism with an indoor sandy beach scene littered with lounge chairs and integrated pull down boxes which conceal informative video screens.

the island has been sculpted by the abundant amount of tourists, creating a landscape of homogenous areas dedicated to a lowest common denominator aesthetic, making an appealing atmosphere for a majority of the visitors. with the current economic climate, these communities which thrived on this once-common and transient lifestyle are now left unused and unwanted by the local residents. see more info on the project here.

image © designboom

reformatting tourism in a hypothetical scenario of a global collapse of the tourist industry, the consequences will be the progressive decline and disuse of the tourist infrastructure with effects on the social, economic and environmental aspects of everyday life. this proposal is based on a strategy of recycling and reusing in order to accommodate new alternative uses for locals and visitors.

image © designboom

the outcome of this analytical process for each topic is a synopsis identifying specific issues, setting specific questions and calling for different kinds of architectural and urban design projects: *urban-tourban symbiosis, *bursting the touristic bubble, *touristic defragmentation and *touristic archaeology. the topics are related to spatial conditions that vary in scales while some of the issues addressed are related to and overlaid in more than one topic. the final goal of the four topics is to focus on specific areas and conditions related to tourism and urbanity in cyprus that can be revisited through architectural projects and proposals. more info here.

image © designboom

image © designboom

image © designboom

wooden lounge chair with attached armature image © designboom

wooden box which contains video screens image © designboom

counterweights image © designboom

counterweights elevate as loungers pull down the wooden box image © designboom

video screens display touristic scenery and information image © designboom

dynamic shadows are projected onto the canvas screens enclosing the exhibit image © designboom