Sunday 25 July 2010

Competition Time!


Since graduating I have worked freelance on a couple of competitions, but nothing that I have initiated myself. Seeing as the windows of opportunity are being slowly and consistently reduced to mere archery slits, a young practitioner such as myself should probably be a lot more keen, entering things willy-nilly with nothing to recommend me but a charming grin and a willingness to work for anyone on anything. Although this is obviously only a route that an ambitious little shit would ever take (although there's never in the history of humanity been a shortage of those, oh no...) I am getting the strange feeling that I ought not to just sit at desks slagging everything that everyone does all of the time.

Now, disregarding the obvious hypocrisy, I thought I would share this - It's a competition to 're-imagine' one of the World's Most Insane Buildings - The Palais de Justice in Brussels. If you ever wanted to understand the architectural and cultural context into which spaces such as the Crystal Palace or the winter garden in general were arriving, then you really have to look at this behemoth, the largest building built anywhere in the 19th century. An eclectic smorgasbord of folderol; a steroidal, syphilitic architecture...

Competition is here.

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