First Works

Perhaps it’s fitting that the exhibition First Works Emerging Architectural Experimentation of the 1960s and 1970s has an Alice in Wonderland feel to it, with the handsome plywood exhibition cases seemingly all too big for the modest AA venue. Just as the show cries out for a larger space, so the fertile imaginations of the then unknowns were straining at the bit at the very start of their subsequently illustrious careers.

Words Pamela Buxton

The simple premis was to show an early project by an architect and update it where possible with comment from the architect today, and in some cases splendid new models. The fun is in seeing how far this work encapsulated the ideas that would preoccupy the architects as their work developed. Certainly if many of these exhibits were displayed anonymously, it wouldn’t have been hard to pick out who did what – with work by Zaha Hadid, Rogers/Foster, Libeskind and Coop Himmelb(l)au particularly distinctive.

There were some intriguing offerings, which said as much about the exciting spirit of the times in the 60s as they did about the architects themselves. Andrea Branzi’s poptastic Structure for Leisure in Prato was all swinging sixties bright colours and groovy shapes. Coop Himmelb(l)au’s Villa Rosa was a radical experiment in pneumatic construction, conceived using eight inflatables including one with a revolving bed. It was to be a truly sensuous experience – as well as projections and sound programming, the architects envisaged fragrances blown in through the ventilation. Archigram founder Michael Webb’s Sin Centre in Leicester Square was essentially a giant car-park embellished with entertainment, with roads and circulation barely separate from the programme. Nearly 50 years later, it’s nice to know he’s still working on the project today.

The Rogers/Foster’s contribution, the charming Retreat, is more of a chill-out zone away from the hurly-burly of the times. The concrete and glass gazebo is half sunk into landscape and is designed to enjoy the views over the Fal Estuary. Foster says it encapsulated a recurring theme of partially-buried glass structures developed in later work such as the Frankfurt Athletics Stadium.

Meanwhile Koolhaas was radically tackling the whole city in his Exodus, or the Voluntary Prisoners of Architecture project of 1972, completed when a student at the AA. Inspired by the Berlin War, he envisaged a strip of ‘intense metropolitan desirability’ through London.

This is more than 60s/70s nostalgia. It’s an uplifting show full of refreshing ideas that, because most weren’t built, remain untainted by compromise and reality, yet give a revealing glimpse of what was to come.

First Works:
Emerging Architectural Experimentation of the 1960s and 1970s, until 18 December, then 11 January to 13 February, Architectural Association, 36 Bedford Square, London www.aaschool.ac.uk