Finland
The exhibition "New Standards" examines the impact of Finnish prefabricated houses produced during and after WWII on architecture, economy, culture, and everyday life. It focuses on Puutalo Oy, an industrial enterprise that exported nearly 9 million square meters of buildings to over 30 countries from 1940-1956, setting a new standard for housing worldwide. The exhibition showcases the extensive architectural production and its contribution to Finland's international reputation in design and mass production. The curators carefully selected designs, photographs, and advertising to illustrate the period's ambitions and architectural legacy.
Supermarket sweep… the Latvian pavilion which has been transformed into a minimart.
This contribution brings a little levity to the long trek through the halls of the Arsenale.
Choice as the basis of architectural process, the pop aesthetics emphasizing the languages of consumption as in Hamilton or Warhol: everything is structured by the dynamics of commerce.
Welcome to T/C Latvija, surely the most instagrammed installation of this edition of the Biennale
Latvia is reopening the archive boxes once again, reminding us (including the Biennial Presidency) of everything that has already been thought up and invented, and inviting us to place the most urgently needed products in the basket, to combine them with one another, and ultimately consume all the knowledge.
Fun, colourful and thought-provoking, it offers a tongue-in-cheek moment to the Arsenale sequence...