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The RIBA Gold Medal 2002
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ARCHIGRAM - RIBA Royal Gold Medalists 2002
Warren Chalk
Peter Cook
Denis Crompton
David Greene
Ron Heron
Mike Webb
Citation by David Rock - Past President RIBA
The phenomenon that is Archigram (from ARCHItecture and teleGRAM)
changed the world of architecture in the sixties and seventies
and has influenced many world class, and less famous, architects
- and architecture generally - ever since. Indeed the group's
ideas have grown even more relevant as time passes. 1991 saw
the reissue of the book that they put together in 1972, and
the Archigram exhibition has been touring the world since
1994.
Archigram certainly matches that part of the conditions of
the Royal Gold Medal Award '… some distinguished person
or group whose work has promoted, either directly or indirectly,
the advancement of architecture.' And architecture in its
wider sense: as Rem Koolhaas wrote recently (in the Introduction
to Report on the City 1 and 2) 'there have been no new movements
in urbanism since Team X and Archigram.'
Archigram is a British group who are known for their work
together over twelve years from the early sixties, and for
producing the broadsheet of the same name (though their output
continued after that in various ways). Its drawn and written
productions looked to be inspired by frontier-work in science
and technology, space travel and NASA, Telstar, Cousteau's
underwater villages and cities, sea-farming, oil-rigs, new
materials and suchlike. But cultural influences were equally
important: Pop Art, the Beatles (a significant parallel?),
science fiction, American comics and films, Batman, Buckminster
Fuller, ARK magazine, the integrated teaching of the Bauhaus,
painting and the global village. The heroic concepts of projects
like 'Walking', 'Instant', 'Plug-in' and 'Computer' Cities,
Sin Centre, Instant Country and Interchange, all became passwords
for a certain kind of approach. As did capsule apartments,
living pods and skins, The Cushicle, Suitaloon, Gasket Homes
and Expandable Place Pads.
The unique strength of the working group that became the
fulcrum of Archigram was that it was six people with a range
of greatly differing perspectives, tastes, skills, age, politics
and backgrounds. Unusually they were from different Schools
of Architecture. Three, David Greene, Peter Cook and Mike
(inevitably Spider) Webb, were just out of college and produced
the first two issues of Archigram. Three, Warren Chalk, Dennis
Crompton and Ron Herron, were experienced with built projects
at the LCC (including excellent schools and the South Bank
complex), a considerable construction track record, and winning
prizes (even if not the first) in national competitions. It
was really the combination of two separate but marvellously
complementary groupings. As Peter Cook has written, 'it was
perhaps its strength that Mike Webb's ability to learn to
play Brahms or hum long passages of Wagner, had little to
do with Dennis Crompton's understanding of engines, or Warren
Chalk's involvement with American painting. The overlap was
an enjoyment of teasing: teasing the architectural extremity
and most of the architectural language.' A necessary irritant,
but, as Spider Webb said, 'being part of society but with
antennae".
Archigram, as noted before, was also the name of their famous
broadsheet whose title sheet proclaimed that it 'was founded
as an occasional journal/manifesto of dynamic ideas for new
architecture.' The first issue in May 1961 was priced ninepence.
By issue 9, in 1970 it was selling over 5000 copies, in many
countries. This showcase-cum-forum to discuss and show the
group's fantastic projects was a symbol of friendly defiance
to the then current orthodoxy. But, more importantly, it also
included the work of many other invited contributions, from
students and young architects like John Outram, Steve Osgood,
Nick Grimshaw and Ken Martin, to innovative architects and
engineers like Helmut Richter, Hans Hollein, Arata lsozaki,
Frei Otto, Yona Freidman and Cedric Price. It was Hollein
who wrote (in 1964) of the group's concept of 'architecture
as a means of communication.' Such communication extended
to exhibitions, poems, writing, lecturing and teaching. But
communication of the ideas by drawing remained crucial. 'The
proof was in the drawing.' And with a thick line so that it
would print easily and look good even on cheap newsprint!
The power of the manifesto, especially in its drawn form,
to promote concepts and advance their own and others' thinking,
was crucial in Archigram's attack on conventional thinking.
There are connotations here of the Futurists, the Italian
Urbanists, and the Metabolists, of whose work Archigram were
aware, as they were of many other architectural influences
in the USA, Europe and Japan - notably Buckminster Fuller,
Louis Kahn and the Vienna circle. They felt part of a continuous
line of discussion from Mies, Gropius, Taut and Corb, through
to CIAM and TEAM 10. They were supported in their promotion
of all these concepts by Reyner Banham, then of the Architectural
Press, Monica Pidgeon of Architectural Design, Cedric Price
and Theo Crosby, among others.
What Peter Cook has called 'The Archigram Effect' is that
of 'dare' and of watching how other architects are sometimes
encouraged to find it possible to innovate, to turn a programme
on its side, to fly in the face of local traditions or inhibitions.
The effect has been to instil a mood of optimism, so that,
however it turns out, a piece of work will not actually worry
too much about justification.
Archigram is a marvellously fitting choice for a Royal Gold
Medal for the beginning of the 21st century, with the message
and mixture of enthusiasm, optimism, debunking, imagination,
harnessing awareness of the boundary-breaking realities of
the sciences and arts outside, or on the edge of, architecture.
While part of history, Archigram's messages can be interpreted
for the future. In one sense, Archigram belonged to a new
sensibility which sought to re-evaluate architectural practice
and to re-define the nature of architecture itself. Surely
of great relevance today?
Archigram sits comfortably alongside those other Gold Medal
recipients whose influence is based on ideas and theory rather
than on built work. They will be the fifth group, as distinct
from individuals, in the roll-call of the other 153 Medal
recipients - following Powell & Moya (1974), the office
of Charles and Ray Eames 1979), Michael and Patti Hopkins
(1994) and the City of Barcelona (1999).
I am pleased to have seen my nomination of Archigram accepted
(unanimously, I believe) by the Royal Gold Medal Jury, and
proud to have had a (very small) involvement in Archigram's
beginnings: by helping fund the early Archigram issues and
by bringing the group to the notice of Reyner Banham, its
greatest supporter.
David Rock
Past President RIBA
RIBA
Gold Medal webpage
Archigram website |
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