MIES BARCELONA
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NAUMON, LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA
9, 10, 11 September 2004

This year marks the 75th anniversary of the construction of Mies van der Rohe’s German Pavilion –widely known as the 'Barcelona Pavilion'– for the International Exhibition of 1929. The Fundació Mies van der Rohe, along with the member institutions of its Board of Trustees, has planned a series of activities to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Pavilion.

During the summer a series of cultural events are being held in different Mediterranean cities with the aim of promoting values such as peace, cohabitation, solidarity and sustainability, such as the Olympic Games in Athens, the European Cultural Capital of Genoa and the Forum Barcelona 2004.

As a contribution to these initiatives, the theatre group La Fura dels Baus has offered its ship, the Naumon, as a meeting point for the Fundació Mies van der Rohe at La Biennale di Venezia.

The Naumon will become the floating site for conferences, exhibitions, workshops and shows. On its itinerary through different Mediterranean ports such as Athens, Barcelona, Beirut, Istanbul, Marseilles and Venice, the Naumon will be transformed into a laboratory where the experiences of these cities may be analysed and compared. Above all, the intention is to meet a common objective in each of these cities: research on social housing and public space as two compatible systems that may be conceived in a unitary way and used as a tool for transformation in deteriorated urban settings.

During the second half of the 20th century, the majority of European cities were subject to phenomena such as immigration and tourism that have resulted in conditions of violent clashes. Moreover, in many cities emergency situations such as wars and natural catastrophes still generate the relentless destruction of their recognisable urban fabrics, resulting in the sudden emergence of new opportunities for construction. During this period, almost all cities were forced to build new housing block developments on their outskirts that disregard the ideas of the Modern Movement concerning typologies and urbanism. The outcome is the rise of new ghettos characterised by deficient connections with the historical city centre, a lack of qualified public space, defective construction and a rigid, unimaginative typological approach to public housing design.

FUNDACIÓ MIES VAN DER ROHE

Board of Trustees:
Ajuntament de Barcelona
Ministerio de la Vivienda
Departament de Política Territorial i Obres Públiques de la Generalitat de Catalunya
Fira de Barcelona
Col·legi d’Arquitectes de Catalunya
Escola Tècnica Superior d’Arquitectura de Barcelona
The Museum of Modern Art, Nova York
Stiftung Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin

Director:
Lluís Hortet

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Curator:
Josep Bohigas

Collaborators:
Laura Arenas
Iván Blasi
Adrià Maynés
Alejandro Raya

Graphic design:
Xeixa Rosa

Special thanks:
La Fura dels Baus, La Biennale di Venezia