The Berlage

Hans Lüning, Plan for Satellite City Kebajoran near Jakarta, Indonesia, 1950. State Archive for Dutch Architecture and Urban Planning, Het Nieuwe Instituut.Architects do not, strictly speaking, make buildings; they interpret, create, and mobilize a range of documents, recognizing their complex and unstable mode of functioning and their capacity to institute new imaginaries to impact the future. This concluding event of The Berlage Theory Master Class, led by Felicity D. Scott, interrogate the unstable relation between architecture and documents by presenting their critical documentaries through which to critique or counter “imperial dispositions.” The “Documenting the Colonial Archive” theory master class, led by Felicity D. Scott at The Berlage, addressed intentional and unintended documents, as found in official and unofficial archives of Dutch colonial administration, as well as in Dutch newsreels and propaganda films, buildings, infrastructures, and other environments and media, both historical and contemporary. Participants will identify key documents or counter-documents, asking themselves what else to do with and through these documents, ultimately advancing the proposition that architects are experts at working with documents, in many media and to various ends.

Guests will include Guus Beumer, Het Nieuwe Instituut; Salomon Frausto, Director of Studies, The Berlage, TU Delft; Stefano Graziani, Photographer, Trieste; Robin Hartanto Honggare, Doctoral Candidate, Columbia GSAPP; Jules Schoonman, Policy Advisor for Academic Heritage, TU Delft.; Amy Thomas, Assistant Professor of the History of Architecture and Urban Planning, TU Delft; amongst others.

Location: Het Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam.