Orban Space: Luc Deleu - T.O.P. office
15 Sep - 17 Nov 2013
Luc Deleu – T.O.P. office, Journey Around the World in 80 Days (Madrid-Weber-Madrid), 1992-1993
Photo: © Luc Deleu – T.O.P. office / Sabam
Photo: © Luc Deleu – T.O.P. office / Sabam
Luc Deleu is one of Belgium’s most innovative and radical urbanist thinkers. Together with his collaborators of T.O.P. office, Deleu has developed an intriguing and consistent oeuvre, spanning more than four decades and constantly challenging the disciplines of architecture and urban planning to raise to its global-scale responsibilities. At Extra City Kunsthal, Deleu presents an ample overview of this parcours, combining recent and older work in an installation that responds to the profile of the institution’s new venue. The exhibition focuses on Orban Space, the 'research by design' project initiated by Luc Deleu and his collaborators of T.O.P. office in 2006.
Orban Space: Luc Deleu – T.O.P. office is curated by Wouter Davidts and Stefan Vervoort in dialogue with T.O.P. office and was first sucessfully presented at Stroom Den Haag. In Antwerp, the exhibition will be expanded and provided with a new scenography devised specifically for the new space of Extra City. The exhibition brings together new productions and historical pieces, aiming to expand current notions of public space to the scale of the earth, and recalculate urbanism as orbanism. Among these continuously updated projects, that build upon streams of spatial, sociological and economic data, the show will include a 400-page Terminology of public space on a global scale, presented in an adapted and expanded version, as well the world map Journey Around the World: Academical Upgrade III, a trajectory for a mobile university that echoes recent debates on academic reformation. These and other works will be put in historical perspective through older material: projects, sketches, models, design tools, and documents dating from the period 1969-2001, many of which have never been shown to the public. Instead of presenting a mere historical survey of the oeuvre of Luc Deleu – T.O.P. office, the exhibition hopes to provide visitors with an intricate view on the free and adventurous explorations of the subject of Orban Space by Deleu and his collaborators.
Especially developed for Extra City Kunsthal, a discursive program will explore five recurring operations and strategies in the practice of Luc Deleu - T.O.P. office: devices, media, measurements, movements, and realities. These themes structure the exhibition and emphasize conceptual affinities and historical continuity between the works on display. Through lectures, performances, films, sculptural interventions and music, the diverse output of Luc Deleu - T.O.P. office will be considered in both its critical and versatile aspects. The schedule of the discursive program, as well as the date of a guided bus tour of a selection of built work of Deleu – T.O.P. office in Belgium and the Netherlands, will be announced on the website www.extracity.org early September.
A book on the work of Luc Deleu - T.O.P. office, edited by Wouter Davidts, Stefaan Vervoort and Guy Chatel, was published by Valiz, book and cultural projects (ISBN 978-90-78088-60-8) in 2012 and will have its Belgian launch during the exhibition period.
The exhibition was co-produced by Stroom Den Haag. The video work Tribune was co-produced with LLS387 – Antwerp, and Etablissement d’en face – Brussels.
Orban Space: Luc Deleu – T.O.P. office is curated by Wouter Davidts and Stefan Vervoort in dialogue with T.O.P. office and was first sucessfully presented at Stroom Den Haag. In Antwerp, the exhibition will be expanded and provided with a new scenography devised specifically for the new space of Extra City. The exhibition brings together new productions and historical pieces, aiming to expand current notions of public space to the scale of the earth, and recalculate urbanism as orbanism. Among these continuously updated projects, that build upon streams of spatial, sociological and economic data, the show will include a 400-page Terminology of public space on a global scale, presented in an adapted and expanded version, as well the world map Journey Around the World: Academical Upgrade III, a trajectory for a mobile university that echoes recent debates on academic reformation. These and other works will be put in historical perspective through older material: projects, sketches, models, design tools, and documents dating from the period 1969-2001, many of which have never been shown to the public. Instead of presenting a mere historical survey of the oeuvre of Luc Deleu – T.O.P. office, the exhibition hopes to provide visitors with an intricate view on the free and adventurous explorations of the subject of Orban Space by Deleu and his collaborators.
Especially developed for Extra City Kunsthal, a discursive program will explore five recurring operations and strategies in the practice of Luc Deleu - T.O.P. office: devices, media, measurements, movements, and realities. These themes structure the exhibition and emphasize conceptual affinities and historical continuity between the works on display. Through lectures, performances, films, sculptural interventions and music, the diverse output of Luc Deleu - T.O.P. office will be considered in both its critical and versatile aspects. The schedule of the discursive program, as well as the date of a guided bus tour of a selection of built work of Deleu – T.O.P. office in Belgium and the Netherlands, will be announced on the website www.extracity.org early September.
A book on the work of Luc Deleu - T.O.P. office, edited by Wouter Davidts, Stefaan Vervoort and Guy Chatel, was published by Valiz, book and cultural projects (ISBN 978-90-78088-60-8) in 2012 and will have its Belgian launch during the exhibition period.
The exhibition was co-produced by Stroom Den Haag. The video work Tribune was co-produced with LLS387 – Antwerp, and Etablissement d’en face – Brussels.