Ireland’s entry to the 11th International Architecture Exhibition will be presented by the Irish Architecture Foundation on behalf of Culture Ireland and supported by the Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon. The Venice Biennale International Architecture Exhibition is the most significant global platform for Architecture. It is instrumental in shaping architecture’s understanding of itself and is a reference point for audiences to engage with the essential issues of our time. One of the primary aims of Ireland’s participation at the International Architecture Exhibition is to showcase as broad a vision of Irish architecture to the largest possible number of people.

The Venice Architecture Biennale represents a vital opportunity to demonstrate the diversity, dynamism and richness of Irish architectural culture to a global audience. Our presence will acknowledge and advance recent shifts in thinking about curating architecture. Rather than simply displaying architecture as an end in itself, exhibitions increasingly serve to interrogate different aspects of the discipline, enabling understanding of a broad definition of architecture, revealing architecture as an artform and stimulating debate.

Ireland’s exhibition must therefore seek to reflect the complex issues being dealt with by contemporary practice. At the same time, it should draw in research and experimental work as well as work from related disciplines. However, its central task is the vivid and direct communication of the quality of architecture being produced today.

Exhibition Theme - The Lives of Spaces

Whatever the political climate, whatever the economic prognosis, whatever the global context, whatever the ecological outlook, architecture remains centrally concerned with the meaningful making of space. The spaces which architecture creates play a central role in our society, framing and structuring the patterns and practices of our collective life. These spaces are the subject of this exhibition.

The life of each space goes through many phases: its life in design – from earliest inception through detailed resolution; its life in construction – from material experiments to working drawings through the many phases of building; and its life in use – its daily functioning, the experiences and opportunities it affords, its gradual absorption into the fabric of people’s lives. Finally there is the symbolic and representational life of space – its role in the formation of individual and collective identity, its capacity to communicate meaning. Space is central to architecture, and yet curiously absent from architectural discourse, perhaps because it is so difficult to define. But space will be the constant focus of this exhbition.

Call for Submissions

Those interested in participating in The Lives of Spaces exhibition are invited to submit proposals in response to the theme as set by the commissioners. We envisage that the exhibition will comprise of one or more practices. Proposals may include the description of the design and/or construction of a space in a practice’s recent or current, built or un-built work. They may involve the detailed consideration of particular aspects of a space’s behaviour – its acoustic performance, the way in which it responds to daylight, to the movement of air etc. They may focus on recording the life of a space in use. They may involve interventions in, or changes to, a given space. The space may be imagined or real. The exhibition may also be an opportunity to revisit older work, to examine existing spaces or spatial typologies. It also offers an occasion for collaborations and experiments, which open up new ways of envisaging, designing and understanding space.

Dates for exhibition

September – November 2008. Development of the exhibition will begin in February, for delivery and installation in Venice in August in time for the opening in early September 2008. Submission requirements

Your submission must contain:
1) 500 word description that should include
- Your response to the theme The Lives of Spaces
- The subject matter of what you wish to present
- The particular aspects of your work that you will explore
- Describe how the material might be shaped for exhibition
2) A one page CV and contact details

Process and Deadlines

Deadline for submission is Friday 1st February 2008. Submissions must arrive via email or hardcopy by 17.00 on Friday the 1st February.
Send to: E-mail: venice@architecturefoundation.ie
Mail: Irish Architecture Foundation, 12 East Essex St, Temple Bar, Dublin 2.

Following this deadline, the commissioners will make an initial selection of participants. The initial selection will be discussed with an advisory panel comprising Claire Doyle Head of Visual Art and Architecture the Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon, Paul Kelly Architect/Former Curator Venice 2006, Mary McCarthy Board Member Culture Ireland/Arts Manager Dublin Docklands Development Authority, Shelley McNamara Architect/Board Member Irish Architecture Foundation, Shane O’Toole Architect/Former Commissioner Venice 2006/2004 and John Tuomey Architect/Former Venice Biennale Exhibitor 2004. The initial selection will be then invited to meet with the commissioners mid February for an elaborated discussion on their proposal. The commissioners will select the final list of participants following this discussion and details of decision will be released.

Queries

You have an opportunity to avail of a Q&A via email regarding this call for submissions. Queries should be emailed by 12 noon on Wednesday 16th January 2008 to venice@architecturefoundation.ie all queries will be responded to by email collectively on the Friday 18th January.

The commissioner’s decision is final. The receipt of all proposals will be acknowledged. Only short-listed participants will be directly informed of the decision and they will be contacted by 8th February and at such time a date will be arranged to meet with the commissioners ASAP.

We do not wish to see models or more elaborate proposals. You may send visuals but it is not essential. This call for submissions is open to those practicing in Ireland or abroad, or to those, of any nationality, resident in Ireland.