The 9th edition of the Urbanism\Architecture Bi-City Biennale (UABB) of Shenzhen and Hong Kong opened on December 10, 2022. Curated by Lu Andong, Prince Gong, and Aric Chen, the exhibition features hundreds of artists, designers, and architects from fifteen countries. The exhibition will last for three months.
The Biennale's theme, "Urban Cosmologies," encompasses both spatial symbiosis and the temporal rhythms of life. It is a source of ancient Chinese wisdom as well as a cosmology that looks to the future. The "Cosmology of the City" is a field of symbiosis, a part of the "community of life between man and nature".
There are five main sections in the exhibition. The first is the "Urgent Question", a prologue to the exhibition, featuring graphic and digital art, which introduces the concept of the exhibition by posing questions; The "More-than-Human Adventure" section follows, which is outside and linked to it by steps, ramps, and underground plazas. This section explores the urban environment as a miniature representation of non-human ecosystems; Back indoors, the "Cosmologic Dialogue" continues. With a strategy and thinking outside of the box, the goal is to connect various viewpoints and look for new chances in the existing urban and architectural development； The "Co-Living Lab" concludes with a focus on cosmology thinking in the urban/architectural field, employing a cosmology perspective to find archetypal future genes and thereby forging new links between several experimental studies.
On the site of the former Kingway Brewery in Shenzhen, the exhibition was constructed. As the venue for the Biennale this year, the Jinwei Beer Factory is being restored under the direction of URBANUS. It is also the No. 0 work at this exhibition. Hundreds of works are dispersed around the maze-like space, which still has some of the brewery's distinctive features and is full of possibilities. These exhibits display the ideas of various artists, designers, and architects about the city and the future.
Discover below several relevant architectural installations at the 2022 SZ-HK Urbanism\ Architecture Bi-City Biennale.
D-39 Local Cast / URBANUS
The installation makes use of the industrial metal material "cast aluminum" in response to the spatial characteristics of the original pool and the historical narrative of Kingway Brewery. On the roof of Building C, thousands of hourglass-shaped modules made of specially cast aluminum rods are put together to create a porous, three-dimensional structure with a funnel-shaped void underneath.
C-09 One Person, All Spirits, Breathing/ Chuan Tian, Zhi Lv, Yang Liu, Jianhua Jiang, Yansong Ma, Tong Liu, Haidong Xu, Shilin Yan, Haiting Sun
The "Last Secret Land" of China, Motuo, serves as the starting point for each unique game created by the designer. The three ostensibly separate components are supported by the room's structural beams and joined by beams that resemble an ecological network. Each piece of art has a climbable ladder that connects it to the ground. In order to coexist with nature, one might choose to either "climb" or "not climb." In this way, we investigate and consider how people ought to coexist with each gorgeous and singularly natural secret location like Murdoch.
C-01 People's Mirror Tower / Zhe He, Haien Shen, Feng Zang｜People's Architecture Office
The People's Mirror Tower at the Kingway Brewery is made up of two triangular cones that are mirrored above and below and are anchored in a U-shaped open area. Although the ecology in which we live may appear to be sturdy, it is actually quite delicate and needs our individual protection. The triangular cone, which supposedly has a metal exterior, and the most stable spatial structure—the tower of mirrors—are built using the thinnest kind of inflatable PVC.
C-02 Reverse Direction Construction / Yichen Lu｜Studio Link-Arc
This installation has the opportunity to grow over time. The top of the inverted pyramid is designed to collect rainwater as much as possible, while the lower portion is well-shaded. The block is made of transparent polycarbonate material with a cultivation base, and because of its porous construction, mushrooms can grow in the spaces on its sides. This procedure will show how natural crops can thrive in the newly created natural environment. The incubator block will be rebuilt and used as a naturally occurring building material after the show is ended.
C-06 Urban Parasitic Furniture Plan / Shuhei Aoyama｜B.L.U.E. Architecture Studio
To address the rich and varied needs of living, the designer mixes individual life with the urban environment in the form of urban furniture. These components, which serve diverse functions and are parasitic in the contemporary urban space, are referred to by the designers as "urban parasitic furniture." Such "urban parasite furniture" extends the original lost life from the private space to the metropolis. and the public spaces of the city serve as replicas of the original invisible "home."
D-30 Steel Grass / Gong Dong x Nu Li｜Vector Architects x Collaborative Artists
The installation creates a perceptible spatial entity by manipulating the inward offset of the plane from the top surface based on the existing spatial boundaries. This new spatial entity is made up of a matrix of 36 7-meter-high rebar bars. Each rebar is given a biological "toughness" by adjusting the length to slenderness ratio and the top weight so that the structural characteristics of the steel itself are sensed in tension during interaction with the observer. It will also integrate the conversation between people and things, as well as between time and space.
SP-08 Profile Relations of Triangles / Yonghe Zhang｜Atelier FCJZ
The installation inserts two slanted walls into the rectangular exhibition area, forming three consecutive triangle spaces. Visitors will have a rich, multi-dimensional experience as they move from the entry to the observation deck due to the triangles' enhancement of perspective and the color blocking's role in the space's spatial variations. The triangle will also gradually reduce top space, which is more in line with the requirement for sustainability and energy efficiency. Visitors are anticipated to understand that spatial design is a crucial instrument for passive carbon control.
D-32 New Applications for Edible Materials - Media Exploration / Fang Hu｜Atelier Fang Food Design Studio
Along with conventional weaving and contemporary computer programming, bubble blowing has evolved into a natural method of creating film texture. The possibilities of this edible bubble substance as a new media tool for the creation of space are investigated by Atelier Fang Food Design Studio. The size of the bubbles can now be adjusted, as can the material. Additionally, it is biodegradable and ecological. While lowering the material's carbon footprint, in situ creation improves how people interact with it.
D-14 Universe / Yansong Ma｜MAD Architects
This is a space and light installation. No one is aware of the location of the universe's edge, so the architect wanted to create an infinite panorama in a small area by hanging up light and reflective materials inside the barrel cavity. People can enter from the steps below and exit from the door above, creating this boundary-less environment.
D-15 Edible City / Bin Zhang ｜Atelier Z+
The Veggie Balloon is a movable, individual, mutual help vegetable growing and eating terminal that is land independent. It is situated in the next homes, neighborhoods, and streets, and when combined with mobile applications, it can be accessed from anywhere at any time, creating a new infrastructure and urban environment. The production and use ends of conventional large-scale agriculture will be totally opened up, enabling for the introduction of vegetable farming into both the private and public spheres of everyday urban life.
D-16 Acoustic Shenzhen / Yichun Liu, Yi Yin｜Atelier Deshaus
Shenzhen's name derives from the village's deep ditch and its murky water. Through the use of the sound of water, "Acoustic Shenzhen" seeks to recreate the city that formerly existed between a tiny fishing community and a large city. A route of water flow is strung out with the sound of water in the spatial installation, which also serves as a route for the audience to walk around, with the flowing imagery of water serving as its central theme. The layers extend to the ocean and glaciers from the drinking water used in city life to the city's water system. creating tangible works for listening to music.
D-17 Trance City / Li Hua｜TAO - Trace Architecture Office
The city of trance has a wide variety of tangible objects, yet just like the chi that permeates this place, neither its shape nor its quality is ever decided from the ground up. The possibility for qi is created by the clash of two times and the marginal conditions of the earth and water. In a collision, energy is produced. In the collision, a scenario of transformation and change is being played out. There is growth and engulfment, ascent and descent, flow and change, never stopping, and this leads to a meteorological and vitality turmoil. As Laozi said in the Tao Te Ching, “the Form of the Formless” and “the Semblance of the Invisible”.
D-18 Breathing City / Chen Chen｜reMIX Studio
The installation uses the continuous alternation of two modalities of expiration and inhalation to examine the theme of carbon in a visual manner, starting from the cosmology of energy. Each balloon takes up the whole exhibition space in the inhalation mode, "trapping" people inside it with a volume equal to each person's daily carbon dioxide emissions. In the exhale mode, the balloons contract and the gallery is semi-dark, allowing visitors to easily wander around.
D-19 Time Medium / Yan Meng, Rui Li｜URBANUS
Things that have passed their expiration date are considered "trash" based on their "timeliness." But rubbish doesn't always manifest itself in an unpleasant way in every place and time. The purpose of this display is to demonstrate how space and time affect value evaluation. If the exhibition space is thought of as a "positive space," then this exhibit will fold a "negative space" into that space: the viewer is unable to enter, but they are still able to see through the window where the subjective evaluation of value and the objective value are intertwined and strayed in it.
D-20 Meeting with Soil / Shu Wang, Wenyu Lu｜Amateur Architecture Studio
The most fundamental and environmentally friendly building material in the world is soil. We must review "soil" once more. The architect requested that people bring a small amount of soil from anywhere in Shenzhen after bringing some "soil" from Hangzhou. Put the soil into any available spot in the exhibition hall, remove a little label from the box, write the soil's location and the person who took it there, and then press the label into the dirt. Through such an exhibition, the piece "Meeting with the Soil" intends to engage with the viewers and build connections between individuals.
D-21 Rain House / Tianying Li, Haotian Zhang ｜FrankanLisa
The Rain House exhibits a walled interior, a residence that is inward-looking. Water is wrapped in plastic film and flows through the building's cavity as the "outside of the building" is rolled into the "interior of the structure." An on-site dehumidifier draws water from the showroom's interior, filters it, stores it, turns it into water vapor, vaporizes it, and then condenses it back down. This water circulates mechanically throughout the facility along clear pipes. The building's borders cracking like a plastic film at the first poke is meant to evoke a trembling emotion in the viewer.
D-22 Household Machine City / Drawing Architecture Studio
Here, "machines" refers to household transportation devices like tricycles, electric cars, mobility scooters, etc. that can also be utilized as tools for industrial production. The household machines, which were initially exclusively used for transportation, were converted into "portable buildings" in the city but were exempt from the regulations set forth for the buildings. The individual's survival wisdom makes full advantage of these "portable buildings" camouflage to maximize the individual's usage of public space while maintaining a light, guerrilla-like posture. The conversion and usage of these domestic appliances is the best use of the scarce resources available to people without access to abundant resources.
