Union Pamphlet

LOST Opportunities

Presented by The Australian Institute of Architects

In the career of any successful architect there exists a catalogue of unrealised projects. While mostly unseen, these projects are part of a process that informs future architectural expressions and often represent the unpacking of progressive or seminal architectural ideas. Lost Opportunities, a symposium presented by The Australian Institute of Architects will investigate the subject matters embodied in unrealised work, including the environment, architectural space, materials and the expression of socio-cultural dynamics. With a lens across international and domestic projects LOST Opportunities provides a platform to foreground the ideas that were significant to their author but never realised – projects that represent lost opportunities, not just for the architect but for the cultures in which they would have existed. Curated by creative directors Angelo Candalepas and Tony Giannone, the symposium suggests that unrealised projects are a crucial and universal aspect of architectural practice.

Lost Opportunities is presented both in-person and online from 18–20 March 2022. The line-up of speakers includes Pritzker laureates, Gold Medal winning architects and some of Australia’s most eminent practitioners and commentators – representing some of the world’s most highly regarded architects.

Speakers include:

Pritzker laureates – Yvonne Farrell, Carme Pigem, Alvaro Siza, Shelley McNamara, Balkrishna Vithaldas Doshi and Glenn Murcutt as well as leading practitioners – Valerio Olgiati, Teresa Moller, Francesco Dal Co, Tony Fretton, Brit Adresen, Kerry Clare, Rick Leplastrier, Virginia Kerridge, Alice Hampson, Helen Lochhead, Sean Godsell, Polly Harbison, Peter Stutchbury, Jessica Spresser, Timothy Hill, Esther Chew, William Smart, Naomi Stead.

Find more information and book your tickets to Lost Opportunities here.

Melbourne Design Week

Presented by the National Gallery of Victoria

Contemporary design is a cultural production reflecting our time, offering alternative viewpoints, commentary and insights through material culture. Melbourne Design Week, 2022, themed ‘Design the world you want’ is supported by two conceptual pillars – ‘Civic Good’, which encourages participants to present works that look beyond the individual to serve the common interest, and ‘Making Good’, which explores the impact of design beyond its functional or aesthetic impact. These catalysts inform a program that includes exhibitions, talks, films, tours and workshops, the biennial Australian Furniture Design Award, a program of design showroom activations and the inaugural Melbourne Design Fair.

New to the Melbourne Design Week program, the inaugural Melbourne Design Fair is is a commercial showcase of limited edition, rare and one-of-a kind collectable design presented by the National Gallery of Victoria in collaboration with the Melbourne Art Foundation. Recognising design as an integral part of the artistic and fiscal vitality of the creative industries, Melbourne Design Fair provides a commercial arena for the presentation and purchase of contemporary Australian design.

The Fair foregrounds design across two platforms: PRESENT, where invited galleries, design organisations, agencies and studios show works by the designers they represent, and SELECT, an exhibition curated by Simone LeAmon (NGV Hugh Williamson Curator of Contemporary Design and Architecture) featuring works by emerging and established Australian designers. Works across both platforms are available for purchase, cultivating the important relationship between commerce, creativity and culture.

See the full Melbourne Design Week program and plan your calendar here.

The Chairity Project 2022

Presented by Cult

Made with cut-out sheet steel, the Result chair is a 1950s design classic by Friso Kramer and Wim Rietveld. Innovative at the time and iconic now, the design forms the basis for the Chairity Project 2022, the fourth iteration of Cult’s fundraising exhibition that invites leading Australian creatives to reinterpret an iconic chair, with the final designs exhibited and auctioned for charity.

For The Chairity Project 2022, Cult has invited 18 creatives from a cross-section of the design industry including industrial design, architecture, interiors, art, scent, ceramics and graphic design to reimagine the Result chair – now in production by HAY.

The online auction and travelling exhibition runs for three weeks with the final designs being exhibited at Cult Design Melbourne during Melbourne Design Week followed by Hay Shop Sydney. Cult’s Chairity online auction page goes live on 17 March 2022 with the auction to close on 3 April 2022. All bids are placed through the website. Proceeds from The Chairity Project 2022 go to Cancer Council, Red Cross, St Vincent de Paul Society, Greening Australia and Gunawirra.

Participating Creatives: Adam Goodrum (nau), Jade Sarita Arnott (Arnsdorf), Michael Lugmayr + Eva Dijkstra (Design by Toko), Yasmine Ghoniem (YSG Studio), Kelvin Ho (Akin Atelier), Alexandra Donohoe Church (Decus Interiors), Josh Cain & Lily Goodwin (Pattern Studio), Shelley Simpson (Mud Australia), Cleo Coppinger & Joshua Anderson (Use Daily), Heather Nette King (Heather Nette King Styling), Tom Fereday (nau), Zachary Hanna (nau), Evi O (Evi O Studio), Jemima Retallack + Mitchell Thompson (Retallack Thompson), Anna Carin (Anna Carin Design), William Smart (Smart Design Studio), Claire Delmar (Studio CD), Craig Andrade (The Raconteur).

Find more information on The Chairity Project here.

Rīvus: the 23rd Biennale of Sydney

rīvus, the title of the 23rd Biennale of Sydney, points to a program that positions rivers, wetlands and other salt and freshwater ecosystems as dynamic living entities with varying degrees of political agency. Hosted along the waterways of the Gadigal, Barramatagal and Cabrogal people, the Biennale of Sydney in 2022 is framed by a series of conceptual wetlands and imagined ecosystems populated by artworks, public events, experiments and research – expanding into a delta of interrelated ideas.

rīvus, meaning ‘stream’ in Latin, will enable aqueous beings – rivers, wetlands and other salt and freshwater ecosystems – to share a dialogue with artists, architects, designers, scientists, and communities. rīvus features new work and commissions responding to water ecology and relationships with the natural world. The list of participants extends beyond the realm of the visual arts and includes bodies of water and their custodians around the world.

The Biennale of Sydney is held at multiple venues throughout Sydney including Art Gallery of New South Wales, Barangaroo including The Cutaway, Circular Quay, Information + Cultural Exchange, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, National Art School in partnership with Artspace, The Rocks and Pier 2/3 at Walsh Bay Arts Precinct.

Find out more about the 23rd Biennale of Sydney and view the full rīvus program here.

Cadeau: Powerhouse Architecture Commission

Presented by Powerhouse Museum

French for gift, Cadeau by Curious Practice is the third iteration of the annual Powerhouse Architecture Commission. The pavilion takes its name from a 1921 sculpture by surrealist artist Man Ray. Like the sculpture, the commission emerges from a desire to re-contextualise objects and places: giving something new to each. The pavilion’s form, materiality and arrangement are intended to prompt an uncanny familiarity to structures and spaces known or forgotten, promising to uncover latent use and memory/opportunity within this – and future – sites.

Cadeau is not a ‘stand-alone’ building or singular gesture, it takes domestic architectural elements and plays with their scale; exaggerating and fusing components to create new meanings and focal points. This process of distortion produces an ensemble of habitable, ready-made ‘furniture’ used to define the central courtyard gathering and meeting place. 

Discover more about the annual Powerhouse Architecture Commission here.

National Indigenous Art Triennial

Presented by National Gallery of Australia

The 4th National Indigenous Art Triennial opens at the National Gallery of Australia with a community celebration led by First Nations artists. The upcoming Triennial, titled Ceremony, explores the integral role of ceremonial acts within First Nations cultures. Showcasing the work of more than 35 artists from across Australia, Ceremony also investigates the ways that ceremonies and rituals continue to act as a prevalent forum for artmaking in First Nations cultures and communities.

Curated by Hetti Perkins, Arrernte and Kalkadoon peoples, Senior Curator-at-large, with National Gallery Curators, The National Indigenous Art Triennial is the Gallery's flagship exhibition series. The exhibition brings together commissioned work by established and emerging First Nations artists from across Australia, creating an important platform for art and ideas.

Find out more about the National Indigenous Art Triennial here.

Union 01 – OUT NOW

The first issue of Union magazine is out now. 

Union 01 collates projects across disciplines – spanning scale, typology and medium – all united by the conceptually-driven processes of their production. With a view to offering insight into how and why a work was created, each essay, review, interview and in conversation provides context and clarity to reflect the rigour and complexity inherent in the work.

The contributing writers for Union 01 are academics, architects, curators and cultural commentators who speak directly to their own projects, or confidently and critically to work that falls within the frame of their research and professional experience. This collection – at once charming and earnest – provides an expanded lens, offering informed perspectives that position each project in broader systems and articulate their inherent cultural value. 

Examining the junctions between disciplines, the projects in this issue are presented democratically. Architectural projects, photography, utilitarian design objects and varied contemporary art practices are positioned in dialogue with one another. Together, the projects in Union 01 present a snapshot of the themes explored through critical spatial practice, communicating shared ways of thinking and making across disciplines.

Order your copy of Union 01 and subscribe to Union magazine here.

Relatively Useful

Presented by Heide Museum of Modern Art

A survey of works in timber, steel and ceramic, designed by John Wardle and Simon Lloyd, Relatively Useful presents 25 pieces that express a ‘gradient of collaboration’ between Wardle, Lloyd and a range of makers from Melbourne, regional Victoria and Hobart. Designed through many conversations and shared drawings, the exhibition presents crafted curiosities – vessels, tables, lighting and objects that suggest apparent use through form, scale and material.

Works in the exhibition have been made by by Sharon Alpren, Kelly Austin, Dan Barker, Adam Browning, Chapman & Bailey, John Cherrey, Bryan Cush, Simeon Dux, Anton Gerner, Wayne Guest, Isabel Avendano Hazbun, Derek Johns, Klynton Krause, Laura McCusker, Adam Markowitz, Fraser Matheson and Andrew Lowe, Joanne Maggs, Kevin Perkins, Alexsandra Pontonio, Scott Mason and Charlie Sandford and Julia Schreckenbauer and Keith McKay, Sajo Ceramics, Josh Stevens, Mari Teed and Vivienne Wong.

Learn more about the exhibition and plan your visit here.