IABR–2020–Down to Earth
September-December 2020
Rotterdam, The Netherlands
The ninth edition of the International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam, IABR–2020–Down to Earth, calls for the submission of proposals in response to challenges and questions formulated in this Open Call for the Water as Leverage exhibition (working title: Flows), one of the core elements of the 2020 biennale.
Prospective participants—including designers, architects, academics, artists, planners, activists, cities, universities, companies, and social organizations—are invited to respond to this Open Call, and submit their applications by November 1, 2019.
IABR–2020–Down to Earth
Down to Earth starts from the premise that we are facing the deepest crisis in human memory. We must urgently rethink the ways we inhabit the Earth, through real climate action, a new political orientation, and integrated planning. This is a design challenge entwined in a political struggle and the opportunity for cultural transformation. We must begin to think of ourselves and our work as a form of political activism, take stock of our capacity for real impact, and remake our disciplines to more purposefully tackle compound global challenges related to the climate crisis.
By showcasing substantive, promising strategies to transform our urban landscapes and living environments, and that stimulate the use of the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in urban development narratives, designs and programs, IABR–2020 aims to foster people’s capacity to act, offer them real prospects for action, and even incite civic activism.
Context and Curators
IABR–2020–Down to Earth is the follow up to IABR–2018–The Missing Link, with which it forms a diptych. This edition explores how we can concretely address the missing link—identified and examined in 2018—by using existing urgent challenges as leverage towards transforming our cities and communities. While IABR–2020 will focus on two major challenges—Water and Energy Transition—as levers for the comprehensive transformation of our urban landscapes, and for devising new ways to inhabit the Earth, the curatorial approaches will differ.
Sarah Ichioka, the Curator for Water as Leverage, and the IABR invite designers and related professionals to submitting concrete design proposals, preferably developed in productive collaboration with local, regional, and national stakeholders, to this Open Call. The final result of the Call—best practices and strategies from around the world—will be presented alongside the main content elements initiated and produced by Ichioka’s team, IABR and its strategic partners, and will form the core of the main exhibition in Rotterdam.
Not only will Water as Leverage comprise a substantial public exhibition in the Keilepand, centrally located in Rotterdam's former fruit harbor and now maker-district, M4H, the Co-Curators for Water as Leverage, Rianne Makkink and Jurgen Bey, will develop associated public programs, events and interventions in and connected to the area—the IABR–Test Site M4H+ since 2018.
Thijs van Spaandonk and Robbert de Vrieze, respective Curator and Co-Curator for Energy Transition as Leverage, will work in Bospolder-Tussendijken (BoTu), the city district in Rotterdam where the IABR–Atelier Rotterdam explores the concept of the “socially inclusive energy district.” They will connect the instances of energy transition in the BoTu-district to other pertinent explorations globally by inviting a selected group of practices to Rotterdam and developing a curriculum (or curatorial narrative) and public program on Energy Transition as Leverage.
The Curator Team is chaired by IABR’s president, George Brugmans.
For further contextual information and insight into the Curator Team’s evolving conversation, please consult the Curatorial Correspondence documents that will be published at intervals on IABR’s website.
Down to Earth opens in the first week of September 2020 (exact dates to be announced) in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and will be open to the public until well in December.
All information on the Open Call, application form and criteria + guidelines can be found at www.iabr.nl. Deadline for submitting strategies for the Open Call is November 1, 2019, 9am (CET).
