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Our highlights from the 8th Architecture & Design Film Festival in New York City

Cinépolis Chelsea

Our highlights from the 8th Architecture & Design Film Festival in New York City

The 8th Architecture & Design Film Festival (ADFF) launched this week at the Cinépolis Chelsea and runs through Sunday, October 2. The opening night film was Eero Saarinen: The Architect Who Saw the Future featuring, and with cinematography by, Eero’s son Eric. Other profiles depict architects such as Marcel Breuer, Gio Ponti, Peter Behrens, Nicholas Grimshaw and landscape architect Piet Oudolf and buildings such as Shigeru Ban’s Aspen Art Museum, the Glasgow School of Art, Dostoevsky’s Drama Theater (Novgorod Spaceship), Neutra’s Windshield House, and Eileen Gray’s Villa E-1027.

We were able to screen a sampling of ADFF films in advance. Here is a brief selection.

Where Architects Live (Francesca Molteni) allows us to peek inside the homes of eight architects: Shigeru Ban, Mario Bellini, David Chipperfield, Massimiliano and Doriana Fuksas, Zaha Hadid, Marcio Kogan, Daniel Libeskind, and Studio Mu. We hear them describe their intimate spaces and we voyeuristically come inside their private world.

Facing Up to Mackintosh muses on what an art school should be and how architecture can make that possible. Looking for the essence of the school and how the Charles Rennie Macintosh building encourages creativity, the principles are reinterpreted by Steven Holl in his new addition with his use of light and voids. The film goes beyond a conventional documentary by featuring interpretive, cinematic experimentations including unusual lenses, cartoons, and the clever music and sound.

Pedro E. Guerrero: A Photographers Journey shows an artist who chronicled the careers of Frank Lloyd Wright (whom he met at an early age at Taliesen West and had unusual access), Alexander Calder, and Louise Nevelson. Guerrero had the ability to capture their work and essence with environmental portraiture.

Bowlingtreff is the strange story of a bowling alley created under the radar in East Germany just before the collapse of the GDR. An exuberantly designed postmodern underground club by Winfried Sziegoleit, with a sensational skylight entry, the remade a 1926 public works building features 14 lanes, cafe, pool tables, and gym. It was constructed by members of the public when funds ran out. Denise Scott Brown and Paolo Portoghesi respond to the place with great delight. Sadly, today it is abandoned and up for sale.

Stefan Sagmeister’s The Happy Film was reviewed by The Architect’s Newspaper earlier this year.

For full information on the ADFF, visit here.

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