Architecture
The spatial concept of unitednationsplaza investigates the ambivalent character of the contemporary art institution. Gallery, theater or school? In the context of their ongoing research on institutional art space architects Nikolaus Hirsch and Michel Müller developed a modular system that can be reconfigured into different formats: from an exhibition into a seminar, from a video screening into a performance, from a lecture into hybrid and unpredictable arrangements. Thus unitednationsplaza becomes a space in which institutional models are displayed.
The urbanistic strategy focuses on the contradictory status of site. The institute oscillates between a systemic model without context and a strategic instrument at Platz der Vereinten Nationen (United Nations Plaza) in Berlin-Mitte. Within the context of a modernist configuration of large-scale buildings the institute converts the office building of a supermarket into modular public space, studios and radio station.
Nikolaus Hirsch is an architect in Frankfurt who teaches at the Architectural Association in London, at the Institute of Applied Theatre Studies at Giessen University and at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. His work includes the Dresden Synagogue, Bockenheimer Depot Theatre (with William Forsythe), the architecture for Frequencies-Hz, music pavilion Soundchambers for Museu Serralves in Porto, the exhibition structure for Bruno Latour´s und Peter Weibel’s Making Things Public at the ZKM, collaborations with artists such as Thomas Bayrle and Raqs Media Collective, the Hinzert Museum and Document Centre, a highrise building in Tbilisi and the European Kunsthalle in Cologne. Nikolaus Hirsch has curated ErsatzStadt: Representations of the Urban at Volksbühne Berlin and is author of several essays. His work was shown in numerous exhibitions such as Neue Welt (Frankfurter Kunstverein, 2001), Utopia Station at the Venice Biennal 2003 and Can Buildings Curate (AA London / Storefront Gallery, New York, 2005).
Michel Müller is an architect based in Frankfurt am Main. He has been guest professor at the department for scenography and experimental space concepts at the Staatliche Hochschule für Gestaltung in Karlsruhe (2004), as well as lecturer and scientist at the Technical University of Darmstadt (1996–2004). In 2004 he earned his doctorate with a dissertation on planning methods of flexible architecture. Since October 2005 he is professor for integrative planning methodology and building technology at the State Academy of Art and Design in Stuttgart. His work includes the Bockenheimer Depot Theatre in Frankfurt in collaboration with William Forsythe, the exibhition architecture for Making Things Public at the ZKM Karlsruhe, Frequenzen-Hz at the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, a music pavilion for the Museu Serralves in Porto, the installation Turm mit Autobahn in collaboration with Thomas Bayrle for the Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt and the installation Node House in collaboration with Raqs Media Collective.