NEWS

.. Towards UIA 2005 İstanbul

The fifth meeting of National Congresses towards UIA 2005 Istanbul took place in Adana and Antakya, Mediterranean cities of Southern Turkey, where more than 800 participants assembled on 24-27 February 2005. The main theme of the meetings was “United City of Cultures and Their Mutual ArchitectureS''. The sixth congress will be held in Kocaeli, Marmara region of Turkey, on 15-16 April 2005 with the theme of “Environment and Architecture in the Industrial City” and the final congress in Ankara, the capital city of Turkey, on 27 May 2005 with the theme “Ankara and Other Republican Cities in the Modernization Process”. A final declaration to be prepared as a sum of all the National Congresses will be presented at the UIA Istanbul 2005 Congress.

Doğan Kuban, Honorary Chairperson of the UIA 2005 Congress, says that both quantity and quality of those willing to participate in the UIA Congress is an early indication of a splendid architectural show of world architects to take place in İstanbul. These include more than 750 proceedings and posters. More than 20 famous keynoters will make speeches, which will be an opportunity for the young generations to benefit from the experiences of the older. The congress program is not limited with these planned presentations, but will also give the opportunity for free discussion forums. Fatih Söyler, Commissary General of the Congress, says that the Congress will be a grand bazaar, which will be open to all the city and citizens, which means that the activities will not be confined to meeting halls and congress valley, but will also be spread to the city with exhibitions, open forums, open air cinemas, cultural activities, performance shows, student workshops, NGO participations, crafts corners and artistic activities.

For the moment, the provisional list of keynote speakers to participate in the UIA 2005 İstanbul Congress include: Rem Koolhaas (Netherlands), Francesco Dal Co (Italy), Peter Eisenman (USA), Massimiliano Fuksas (Italy), Zaha Hadid (Britain), Zvi Hecker (Israel), Glenn Murcutt (Australia), Joseph Rykwert (USA), Moshe Safdie (Israel), Alexandros N. Tombazis (Greece), Robert Venturi (USA), Charles Correa (India), Sumet Jumsai (Thailand), Kengo Kuma (Japan), Abdelaziz Lazrak (Morocco), Fumihiko Maki (Japan), Mikhail Piotrovsky (Russia) and Ken Yeang (Malaysia).

Please note the contact information for the UIA 2005 İstanbul Congress Office in İstanbul:

A: İTÜ Mimarlık Fakültesi, Taşkışla, No:125 34437 Taksim İstanbul

T: +90 212 252 94 25 (pbx)

F: +90 212 252 94 24

For all information and news regarding the UIA 2005 İstanbul Congress: www.uia2005istanbul.org

.. From the World of Architecture

The Aydın Doğan Foundation, primarily dedicated to develop, encourage and support people involved in the fast changing media industry, has determined the theme of this year’s Grand Award as “Urban Architecture, Urban Texture”. As a result of the jury assessment among 34 projects, İzmir Konak Square Planning Project and Kastamonu Historical City Center Rehabilitation Project were awarded. The theme was welcomed very positively by the architectural community for the promotion of well-quality urban design in Turkish cities. 25 projects submitted to the award programme will be exhibited during the UIA 2005 İstanbul Congress. For further information: www.aydindoganvakfi.org.tr

URBAN TRANSFORMATION

.. Protecting Ulus X Transforming Ulus / Ömer Kıral

Ulus, historical center of Ankara, has recently become the stage of criticism because of a new urban transformation project brought into the agenda by the Metropolitan Municipality. The project is at a preliminary phase and the major criticism is that it lacks democratic participation of citizens and public interest parties. As a matter of fact, the Municipality has recently abandoned the Ulus Public Improvement Plan, which was prepared by city planner Raci Bademli and started its application after being selected at a competition opened by the Municipality in 1986 for this purpose. The author says that the annulment of the Public Improvement Plan created a crisis that is an outcome of “anti-planning approach”.

FILE

.. Poverty and Architecture: Two Separate Worlds? / Editor: Bülend Tuna

* Immigrants and Poverty: Parallel Roads / Vassilis Sgoutas

* Some Comments on the Speech of Vassilis Sgoutas in Diyarbakır: How Can “Poverty” Become a “Client” of Architecture? / Oktay Ekinci

* Poverty and Architecture / Suha Özkan

* Poverty-Wealth Opposition and Architecture / Yücel Gürsel

* Approaches of the Chamber of Architects to the “Shanty Town” Problem through History: Readings from the Journal MİMARLIK / Nuray Bayraktar

* Structural Analysis of the “Shanty Town” Problem in Turkey and an Improvement Model Proposal / Hülya Turgut

The file attempts to bring into light alternative answers that architecture and architects may give to the question of “poverty”. The aim is to extend the discussions beyond personal efforts of architects that devote their energy to poverty problems and, therefore, to question the “social engagement of architecture”. Can an architect behave as a doctor that examines a poor patient for free? Like the other fine arts through the history, architecture has also been under the service of those privileged people who can pay for it, but on the other hand we should not forget the tradition of civilian architecture, which has produced buildings in modest conditions. Within this historical framework, the file underlines that architecture should be conceived as a vital demand in the society. Vassilis Sgoutas, former President of the UIA, has made a speech sharing similar views during the National Congress (towards UIA 2005 Congress) in the Mardin city of Turkey. The theme of the congress was “Public Improvement and Architecture in the Cities under the Pressure of Immigration”. According to Sgoutas, immigration and poverty are two parallel roads and the role of the architects and urban planners is to contribute to the development of urban and social structures that will integrate immigrants to the urban life. Referring to the speech of Sgoutas, Chamber’s President Oktay Ekinci says that in order to make architects serve for the poor and create humanitarian conditions for these people, social institutions, local administrations, non-governmental organizations should become the “clients” of architects “in the name of the poor”. In his article, Suha Özkan, Secretary General of the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, presents the architectural works for the poor groups of the society, saying that these works can be classified in three groups; technology based approaches, infrastructural solutions and economic support processes. Yücel Gürsel, former President of the Chamber, focuses on the poles of extreme poverty and extreme wealth created in today’s world and says that architecture, which serves to wealthy groups in these circumstances, does not criticize and question to reduce the effects of this polarity. Nuray Bayraktar, who made a research on the Chamber’s positions towards shanty towns by making a historical reading of our journal MİMARLIK, says that the Chamber has approached to the issue within the framework of urbanization and housing problem and played significant role in fighting with the problem in public interest with other similar organizations. Hülya Turgut, who makes a structural analysis of the shanty town problem in Turkey, explains the unsuccessful methods used in Turkey for the rehabilitation of shanty towns and proposes a new model for the handling of this poor sheltering areas.

COMPETITION

.. Eskişehir Tepebaşı Municipality Service Building Architectural Project Competition

The results of the national and one-stage competition opened for the architectural design of Eskişehir Tepebaşı Municipality Service Building were announced on December 2004. Among 91 participating projects, three received awards, three honorary mentions and four mentions. The colloquium and awarding ceremony was realized in Eskişehir on 8 January 2005. The winning project was submitted by Selim Velioğlu, Sunay Yusuf and Erce Funda. According to the jury, “The project not only forms urban continuities through graded outdoor spaces and pedestrian circulation schema, but also has an urban character that extends beyond its program”.

EDUCATION BUILDINGS

.. SCHOOLS: From Sumerian Temples to Global Temples / Şengül Öymen Gür

Education buildings are one of the issues carried to newspaper headlines nowadays. The news includes some controversial and speculative discussions pointing at a transformation in the conception and design of public school buildings. The author says that the public authorities’ approach to the problem is lacking for a number of reasons because rather than promoting the development of education facilities wits its own resources; they resort to financial support from the society through campaigns, income from advertisement posters to be hanged on school fences and money aid from foreign institutions. On the other hand, there is also news that the public authorities are working on mega campus projects that foresee an education capacity of 15 to 20 thousand students in a single campus. The article discusses on these actual developments through a historical perspective that takes a glance at the conception of education and design of school buildings throughout the history.

ARCHITECTURAL EDUCATION

.. Architect as a Facilitator / Architecture as an Instrument of Social Politics / Deniz İncedayı

In her article awarded by the European Association of Architectural Education (EAAE), Deniz İncedayı questions the social dimensions of architectural education and proposes alternative perspectives for the role of architecture, not only to be limited with the design of buildings and spaces but also extended to the reproduction of diverse social, cultural and environmental values of the humanity. The article looks for alternative models that can be generated in the fields of basic design, theoretical works and architectural project studios. The aim is to present possibilities to strengthen architecture’s role as an instrument of social politics.

.. A Case Study for the Out of Curriculum Components of Architectural Education: Architectural Project Competitions for Students / Nur Çağlar

The number of design and architecture competitions open to students has considerably increased in the recent years and the student category, as much as the professional one, started to gain importance in the architectural community. The competitions are supportive activities for the professional formation of the students; they attract the attentions of students to the actual issues and they are effective in introducing students the developing and changing methods, materials and technologies in the design and construction sector. They also provide students the consciousness of professional competition. The article discusses these positive feedbacks of competitions to students through a case study: “Reflections on the Living Environment for Elderly”, a competition for students supported by the EAAE and resulted in May 2004. The article also takes a glance at the winning projects. A project of two students from the Gazi University in Turkey has received honorary mention in the competition.

MEA ARCHITECTURA MEA CULPA

.. To a Poor Building… / Gürhan Tümer

“Look at this photograph. Look more closely at the building in it. Otherwise you can not see it, because it is thin, it is slender, it is very thin. I look at it carefully and I see it. And I say: The building has fibers of hair…Or strands of feather. Maybe nerves and vessels giving life to it… Made up of iron… Why are those irons in such disorder? Why are they swinging on the space? Tell me poor building, tell me… Why is your hair so miserable? Why is your feather straight

up? Why are your nerves and vessels exposed? What a poor building…”

MİMARLIK . 323 . May-June 2005

English Summary by Tuğçe Selin Tağmat