Student Workshop – 20th Conference

top: the Athens Conservatoire designed by Ioannis Despotopoulos (completed in 1976).

Athens workshop (tentative)

3-8 September 2028

In the spirit of collaboration among stakeholders and the significance of interdisciplinarity, we aim to organize a student workshop that brings together architecture students and students from the Athens Conservatoire. Their interaction will take place in the historic building of the Athens Conservatoire, a characteristic example of the modern movement in Greece, designed by Ioannis Despotopoulos.

Athens Conservatoire’s main Auditorium under construction.

Ioannis Despotopoulos (1903-1992) studied at the NTUA School of Architecture but he soon left for Weimar, where he enrolled in the Bauhaus School, to graduate from the School of Architecture in Hanover. In 1943 he was elected Professor at the NTUA School of Architecture but he was dismissed in 1946, for his political convictions.

From 1947 to 1961 he settled in Sweden, at the invitation of the Svenska Institutet. There he worked as a free-lance architect and taught as professor extraordinarius in Stockholm, Gotheburg and the University of Uppsala.

In 1959 he awarded the First Prize in the competition for the Athens Cultural Centre. In 1961 he returned to Greece and was re-appointed professor at the NTUA.

For the needs of the workshop, both the interior and exterior spaces of the Conservatoire(arcades, courtyards, surrounding areas) will be utilized. The aim of the experiential workshop is to integrate the tools and techniques used in the performing arts(such as body, movement, rhythm, melody, and prose) with the corresponding elements of architecture(including composition, proportions, form, materiality, light, and sound). We anticipate results that blend methods and techniques, activate the body and movement, and primarily enhance the connections between artists and scientists.

The Athens Conservatoire is the oldest and the most prestigious educational institution of performing arts in modern Greece, founded as a non-profit organization in 1871, encompassing all three disciplines, Music, Theatre, Dance, under a single roof.

World-renowned personalities such as Dimitri Mitropoulos, Maria Callas, Nikos Skalkotas, Dimitris Myrat, Kostas Mousouris, Dimitris Rontiris and many others, studied or started their careers here, while its activities sparked the creation of organizations such as the National Orchestra and the National Theatre of Greece.

Moreover, its iconic building at the heart of Athens, an officially designated “Modern Architectural Monument” by the Ministry of Culture, designed by Ioannis Despotopoulos, an “ambassador” of modern and bauhaus architecture in Greece, make it a unique and enviable cultural hub for various contemporary art and cultural events, cultivating a vibrant environment of artistic expression for its community and the citizens and visitors of Athens.

athensconservatoire.gr

top: “Ss. Cyril and Methodius” University Campus (UKIM) in Skopje designed by Marko Mušič (1974).

bottom: Sports Palace Sports Palace in Durres, Albania, designed by S. Mosko, R. Semini, P. Qafzezi (1969).

Satellite workshops and other events

Skopje workshop

The workshop will be focused on valuable, yet endangered late-modernist heritage in Skopje. On-site visit and exploration of a selection of modernist buildings would give the participants an insight both into the architectural qualities, the present condition and various perils these buildings face within the contemporary urban context of Skopje. The workshop aims to invite the participants to reflect upon this heritage, to initiate productive discussion, foster better understanding and introduce and develop possible strategies for conservation of the modernist heritage in Skopje.

Skopje walking tours

Skopje post-earthquake reconstruction

Skopje brutalist architecture

Skopje post-earthquake housing estates

The role of women architects in the post-earthquake reconstruction of Skopje

Sofia workshop

A multilayered and contested modern building/ housing estate which to be subjected to live analysis, interpretations and suggestions for ad-hoc interventions for a long-term strategy of development. It is important for the object to underline and multiple modern identities of a former bоurgeois and former socialist and now distinctly neoliberal and postsocialist city. It is also important for the workshop to be communicated with the local public and institutions, apart from the experts

Sofia walking tours

Prewar Modernism – city centre, purist examples, brick expressionism, the influence of women in architecture

Postwar Modernism – Sofia Eastern Tour

Postwar Modernism – Sofia Western Tour

Tirana workshop