Permanence VS Temporality

Round table held within the context of Architecture in the Extreme

By conceiving a territory in anthesis and naming it Antarctica, the Greeks at once prophetically foresaw the essential role that the ultimate continent laboratory would play in our world’s ecosystem and synthesised in the short prefix (ANT-) the endless paradoxes that the southernmost territory conceals.
Driven by the conviction that it is essential, in the midst of the Anthropocene, to shift the attention South and reflect on existing and future modes of inhabitation in the extreme, Giulia Foscari curates a series of Antarctic Conversations run by Antarctica 200 within the context of the London Design Festival.
Antarctic Conversations between polar experts from the fields of architecture, engineering, science, medicine and psychology will unfold at the AA as a tryptic of Round Tables, each addressing a set of Antarctic antinomies.

Intuitively, the unforgiving temperatures of the coldest and driest desert of the world should present the ideal conditions for preservation. Literally “frozen in time”, any artefact that is brought to the continent, when not buried under meters of snow over winter, has the potential of everlasting conservation. Yet, the policies drawn up at the seventh Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting (and its later addendums) define the guidelines to ascertain which structures should indeed be listed as Antarctic “Historic Site and Monuments” and which instead should be dismissed from the continent to reduce human contamination. A debate on the paradoxes by which, in Antarctica, permanence is embodied by fragile prefabricated wooden structures that stand as testament of pioneering imperialistic explorations and covert military operations whilst temporality is seen as a defining design constraint for all new experimental scientific station will be central to the first Antarctic Conversation.
The presentations will include reflections on the heritage listing criterions, on the logistic challenges of restoring structures at such low latitudes, on the reviewed design requirements for new experimental constructions and on the possibility of rethinking quasi-urban scientific stations.

Speakers, in order of presentation include:
Michael Morrison, Purcell
Geoff Cooper, UK Antarctic Heritage Trust
Hugh Broughton, Hugh Broughton Architects
Rick Petersen, OZ Architecture

moderators (Polar Lab directors):
Giulia Foscari, Antarctica 200 Co-Director, UNA/unless
Francesco Bandarin, Antarctica 200 Co-Director
Arturo Lyon, PUC
Juan Du, HKU

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Giulia Foscari – Curator + Antarctica 200 Co-Director, Polar Lab Co-Director (UK) 
Giulia Foscari is an architect, curator and author who has been practising in Asia, South America and Europe. She is the founder of UNA, a Hamburg-based international architecture practice focussed on cultural projects; founder of UNLESS, a non-for-profit platform dedicated to research on the effects of the Anthropocene; and partner of Foscari Widmann Rezzonico Associati, an architecture practice based in Venice. Her working experience includes an extensive collaboration with OMA (Office for Metropolitan Architecture) which started in Hong Kong in 2009 and led her to run OMA’s South American platform. In 2014 Giulia authored “Elements of Venice”, a book published by Lars Müller Publishers which was awarded the DAM Architectural Book Award. In parallel to practicing architecture, Giulia worked on multiple curatorial projects (including exhibitions in four editions of the Venice Biennale) and is engaged in academia. Giulia taught at Hong Kong University for five academic years, and ran a Diploma Unit at the Architectural Association (between 2015 and 2018) where she now co-directs the Polar Lab. 

Francesco Bandarin – Antarctica 200 Co-Director, Polar Lab Co-Director (UK) 
Francesco Bandarin is an Architect and Urban Planner, specialized in Urban Conservation. From 2000 to 2010 he was Director of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre and Secretary of the World Heritage Convention. From 2010 to 2018 he served as Assistant Director-General of UNESCO for Culture. He is currently Special Advisor for heritage of the UNESCO Director-General. He is a member of the Steering Committee of the Aga Khan Trust for Culture and a member of ICOMOS Italy. He has been Professor of Urban Planning and Urban Conservation at the University of Venice (IUAV) from 1980 to 2016. His recent publications include: “The Historic Urban Landscape: Managing Heritage in an Urban Century”, 2012 and “Reconnecting the City. The Historic Urban Landscape Approach and the Future of Urban Heritage”, 2015, both co-authored with Ron van Oers and published by Wiley-Blackwell. A comprehensive book on the Historic Urban Landscape experience, “Re-shaping Urban Conservation”, co-edited with Ana Pereira Roders, is forthcoming by Springer. 

Arturo Lyon – Polar Lab Director (CL) 
Arturo Lyon is an architect dedicated to the experimental and professional development of architecture, landscape and urban design projects. He is founder of Lyon Bosch + Martic Arquitectos, firm that has carried out several public and private projects, including the XVIII Biennial of Architecture of Chile, the Las Majadas de Pirque Hotel, the Cerros de Chena Park — associated with Teodoro Fernández —and the Metropolitan Civic Promenade for the redesign of Alameda - Providencia, Santiago's main boulevard — associated with Groundlab.  Arturo is Professor of the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Urban Studies of the Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile (PUC) in the areas of design studio, technology and landscape architecture. He leads the design studio courses for the undergraduate School of Architecture and is member of the Public Space Group of the Nacional Committee of Urban Development of Chile. 

Juan Du – Polar Lab Director (HK) 
Juan Du is Associate Professor, Associate Dean (International), and Director of the Urban Ecologies Design Lab at the University of Hong Kong. She also leads IDU_architecture, with projects ranging from the extent of built form to the social and ecological processes of the city, and her works have been published and exhibited in Asia, Europe and the United States. Juan's research and design focus is on the relationships between the urban and architectural, formal and informal, and specifically on informal settlements of extreme high-density within rapid urbanization. An upcoming book “The Shenzhen Experiment”, will be published by Harvard University Press in winter 2019. Juan has previously taught at MIT and Peking University, and her past curatorial projects includes Hong Kong’s participation in the 2010 Venice Biennale and the Housing an Affordable City Exhibition at the 2011 Shenzhen Hong Kong Biennale. 

Michael Morrison – Purcell
Michael is an architect and former chairman of Purcell. He first visited Antarctica in 2003 for to write conservation plans for Scott and Shackleton’s huts. He subsequently surveyed the historic huts down the Antarctic Peninsula and is currently involved with the conservation of the whaling stations on South Georgia.

Geoff Cooper – UK Antarctic Heritage Trust
Geoff is the Heritage Programme Manager for the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust. Geoff is a traditional oak framed carpenter who specialized in the conservation and repair of Mediaeval and Tudor timber framed buildings. This craft skill combined with a life-long passion for Antarctica led to Geoff being employed as a Conservation Carpenter, initially by the NZ AHT to work on the Heroic era Huts in the Ross Sea and subsequently by the UK AHT to work on the Historic British bases on the Antarctic Peninsula.

Hugh Broughton – Hugh Broughton Architects
Hugh Broughton is the founder of Hugh Broughton Architects, one of the world's leading designers of buildings in Antarctica. Completed projects include the relocatable British Halley VI and Juan Carlos 1 Spanish Antarctic Base. Current projects include the redevelopment of Scott Base for Antarctica New Zealand and the modernisation of Rothera Research Station for the British Antarctic Survey.

Rick Petersen – OZ Architecture
As a Principal with OZ Architecture, Rick leads a wide range of design projects that benefit from collaboration among highly diverse stakeholders, whether in his home town of Denver or in Antarctica, where he led the redesign of McMurdo Station for the National Science Foundation. His work yields resource-efficient communities that promote well-being, including transit-oriented development (TOD), workforce housing, corporate office, higher education and cultural facilities.