Bungalow Germania

Exhibition

Bungalow Germania

This year’s German contribution to the 14th International Architecture Exhibition – la Biennale di Venezia, created by architects Alex Lehnerer and Savvas Ciriacidis, responds to Artistic Director Rem Koolhaas’ overarching theme, “Absorbing Modernity: 1914–2014,” by questioning representational architecture. Germany is looking back at a century full of political and social fractures and continuities, in which the nation repeatedly defined itself anew. In this context, BUNGALOW GERMANIA examines the tension between national identity and its built, architectural expression. It hereby not only understands architecture as a reflection of ideological power structures, but also as a constitutive force within existing societal circumstances.

Two buildings of national and historical importance anchor the project within the past century: the German Pavilion and the Kanzlerbungalow [Chancellor Bungalow] in Bonn, realized by Sep Ruf in 1964. The Kanzlerbungalow was ubiquitous in the West German media during the tenure of the Bonn Republic, and functioned as the “nation’s living room.” When the capital of the Federal Republic of Germany moved from Bonn to Berlin in 1999, the Kanzlerbungalow lost its visibility as an object and vanished into oblivion. These two buildings represent two eras of German history, two political systems, and two architectural languages. Both buildings were instrumentalized by their owners as a statement on nationhood or as a promise to the nation.

In Venice, the Pavilion and Bungalow enter into dialogue with each other through an architectural montage. A 1:1 partial replica of the Bungalow creates an accessible spatial installation in its cross-cutting with the architecture of the Pavilion. The instal-lation connects ideas, moments in time, actual places, and spaces. Here the Bungalow’s materials and elements function as media that transport past political gestures and symbolic actions from Bonn to Venice.

The situative conjunction of the two buildings forms a “third space,” which obscures the organization and character of the original spaces. One building thus becomes the key to the other. The Pavilion reads and references itself through the Bungalow, and vice versa, to create a dual legibility. This conversation opens up a spectrum of associations with the forms and uses of these architectures and the (German) history associated with them.

Download Curatorial Statement

Bungalow Germania State Visit
BUNGALOW GERMANIA, 2014
© CLA / Photo: Bas Princen
Two nationally and historically significant buildings encounter each other in Venice in 2014: the German Pavilion and the Kanzlerbungalow [Chancellor's Bungalow] in Bonn, realized in 1964 by Sep Ruf.
Bungalow Germania Exhibition
BUNGALOW GERMANIA, 2014
© CLA / Photo: Bas Princen
BUNGALOW GERMANIA is an accessible spatial installation created through the intersection of the partially replicated Kanzlerbungalow in Bonn with the architecture of the German Pavilion.
Bungalow Germania Exhibition
BUNGALOW GERMANIA, 2014
© CLA / Photo: Bas Princen
The situative meeting of the two buildings plays with visitors’ expectations. When they enter the Pavilion through its ten-meter-high portico, visitors suddenly find themselves in the low-ceilinged interior of the Bungalow.
Bungalow Germania Exhibition
BUNGALOW GERMANIA, 2014
© CLA / Photo: Bas Princen
In the Bungalow’s central patio, the exhibition space opens upward toward the Pavilion’s ceiling. Here, one can see the cornice that encircles the entire room, a remnant of the suspended ceiling that was removed in 1964.
Bungalow Germania Exhibition
BUNGALOW GERMANIA, 2014
© CLA / Photo: Bas Princen
The elements of the two architectures lose their immediate, clear functional role. They become visible in new constellations and reciprocally exhibit one another. This ambiguity invites viewers to participate actively, and complicates their observation process.
Exhibition sketch
BUNGALOW GERMANIA. The Pavilion plinth fits neatly under the Bungalow.
© CLA / ETH, 2014
Bungalow Germania Plan Diagram
BUNGALOW GERMANIA. Plan diagram of the Pavilion’s main space with apse, patio and central access. The centric plan of the Bungalow superimposes on the axial plan of the Pavilion.
© CLA / ETH, 2014
Kanzlerbungalow
View of the “Kanzlerbungalow” from the park; in the foreground, “Die drei Grazien” by Bernhard Heiliger, 1989.
© Bundesregierung / Photo: Lothar Schaack, Sculpture by Bernhard Heiliger: © 2014, ProLitteris
Kanzlerbungalow Park
Stroll through the park: Secretaries of State Egon Bahr (FRG, right) and Michael Kohl (GDR) with the Chancellor’s Bungalow in the background, 1972.
© Bundesregierung / Photo: Ludwig Wegmann
Kanzlerbungalow Park
Chancellor Helmut Kohl (right) greets Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip in front of the Kanzlerbungalow, 1992.
© Bundesregierung / Photo: Christian Stutterheim
Coalition Talks
The national living room. Coalition talks between the SPD and FDP in the Chancellor’s Bungalow. (L-R) Alex Möller and Helmut Schmidt (deputy chairmen of the SPD), Willy Brandt (SPD party chairman), Walter Scheel (FDP party chairman), and Hans-Dietrich Genscher, (deputy chairman of the FDP), 1972.
© Bundesregierung / Photo: Ludwig Wegmann
TRACE OF ELEMENTS (PREVIEW), film: Tobias Kaufmann & Dominik Gehring.