Levente Polyak

Adaptable City: The problems and opportunities of vacant properties
December 10, 2013 ‒ April 30, 2014

The Adaptable City exhibition is an introduction to the logic of in-between use, showing the basic questions, architectural, economic and legal conditions of the reuse of empty urban properties. Through examples and case studies, the exhibition discusses the dilemmas and opportunities of both bottom-up initiatives and property owners or the public administration. The show is conceived as a process: the content structure displayed at the opening will be continuously complemented and enriched with the findings and materials of the workshops organized in the gallery to link international best practices with the latitudes and limitations of the Budapest context.

Opening: December 10, 2013 (Tuesday) 6 p.m.
Venue: Budapest V. district, Kossuth Lajos str. 14-16.

Curator: Levente Polyák (KÉK)
Co-curator: Júlia Oravecz
Installation: Orsolya Vadász, Bulcsú Szabó
Design: Ádám Albert
Texts: Levente Polyák, Júlia Oravecz, Ágnes Deigner, Dániel Kovács

Ember a térben! – beszélgetés és drámapedagógiai foglalkozás
December 2., 19h.
Stúdió Galéria, Budapest, VII. Rottenbiller u. 35.
http://negyed6negyed7.com/event/ember-a-terben/

Lehúzott redőnyök, üres kirakatok, betört ablakok, bezárt tátongó terek. Bár sok fotós kedvelt témái ezek, mégis pazarlóan sok hasonlóval találkozhatunk Budapesten. Milyen hatással van ez a város, s az ott lakók életére? Mit gondolnak erről az okosok, s mit jelentenek számunkra ezek a helyek? Milyen megoldásokat találtak a problémára külföldön, s milyen lehetőségeink lehetnek idehaza? Mi a mi felelősségünk? VI-VII. kerületi fotókkal bevilágított teremben beszélgetünk egy környezetpszichológussal, egy urbanistával, egy fotóssal, s egy rendezővel ember és tér viszonyáról. Az este második felében pedig drámapedagógiai foglalkozáson vehetünk részt a képekkel átitatott falak között, együtt kísérletet téve az elhagyott terek életre keltésére, miközben mi magunk is beleolvadunk a fényből rakott épületek szövetébe.

Vendégeink lesznek:
Dr. Dúll Andrea, az ELTE Gazdaság- és Környezetpszichológia Tanszékének tanszékvezetője, A környezetpszichológia alapkérdései, Helyek, tárgyak, viselkedés című könyv szerzője.
Polyák Levente, urbanista, kutató, kritikus. A budapesti Kortárs Építészeti Központ kuratóriumának, s a LAKATLAN csapatának tagja.
Fekete Anikó, a Károli Gáspár Református Egyetem Színháztudomány, és az ELTE ének-zene karvezetés szakos hallgatója, a MégIs Társulat rendezője.

FB EVENT: http://on.fb.me/17zVEob

Few publications and books deal specifically with architecture from an interdisciplinary perspective, especially from the ‘fiction angle’. The editorial scope outlined in this book intends to be perceptive and distinctive. It aims at serving scholars, architects, designers, authors, students and a wider, non-professional audience. It is a contribution to the field and pushes forward research in architectural practice and thought in intriguing and exciting directions, at a time when the professional activity is pressing its traditional and almost exhausted limits.

Precisely in this moment, in which one may question architecture’s inclination to become a pseudo-technical service or mere signature shape-giving; in which one may question urban planning’s propensity to produce social failure, one may as well ask if the imagination of fiction is not the ultimate gizmo with which to face a reality that has gone… stranger than fiction. (Pedro Gadanho + Susana Oliveira, editors)

European cities are changing rapidly in part due to the process of de-industrialization, European integration and economic globalization. Within those cities public spaces are the meeting place of politics and culture, social and individual territories, instrumental and expressive concerns. Public Space and the Challenges of Urban Transformation in Europe investigates how European city authorities understand and deal with their public spaces, how this interacts with market forces, social norms and cultural expectations, whether and how this relates to the needs and experiences of their citizens, exploring new strategies and innovative practices for strengthening public spaces and urban culture.

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“Mobilité dans la ville intelligente : le défi de l’automobile”
Conférence de Levente Polyak
Jeudi 7 novembre, 14h30
Salle 308, Batiment Perret
École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture Paris-Malaquais
Laboratoire Infrastructure, Architecture, Territoire

The Municipality of Budapest and the Hungarian Contemporary Architecture Centre proudly presents the first event of the Coming Soon! Project Gallery:

RETHINKING SPACES OF RETAIL: SKÁLA METRÓ AT NYUGATI SQUARE
Date: 14 – 17. November 2013.
Venue: 1053 Budapest, Kossuth Lajos utca 14-16.
Guest: Failed Architecture (Amsterdam)
The workshop and the lectures are held in English. The public events are open and free of charge.

The Failed Architecture Workshop takes place in the framework of the 6-month series organized by Lakatlan Budapest (KÉK) presenting Dutch approaches to vacancy, supported by the Creatieve Stimuleringsfonds NL.

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Wonderland Magazine: Activate&involve
Edited by Daniela Patti and Levente Polyak

In the frame of its summer festival Wonderlab, Wonderland Platform for European Architecture published three new magazine volumes on contemporary architectural practices. Issue 3, with texts by Indira Van’t Klooser and Coloco, interviews and case studies from all across Europe, is available online at issuu.

At TEDx Vienna organized on September 20, Daniela Patti and Levente Polyak talked about how the wonderland platform for european architecture contributes to developing collaborative planning strategies in cities in Europe with its Project Space series.

Reclaimed spaces – mapping workshop with Levente Polyak and Vitalie Sprinceana
September 10-12, 2013
Zpace (Casa Zemstvei Guberniale)
Sciusev str. 103, Chisinau

You are invited to take part in the mapping workshop Reclaiming spaces that will be organized between 10-12 of September 2013. Please send a letter of intent by September 6, 2013 to: vladimir@oberliht.org.md and vitalie.sprinceana@gmail.com

The purpose of this workshop is to teach activists on how to use interactive technologies (web alerts, websites, blogs, and maps) in order to better coordinate their efforts and to enhance the communication between them, between activists and authorities and between citizens and activists. The idea is to provide activists with more efficient tools and to use the possibilities of social media/internet in order to build a more robust civil society.

The workshop will introduce various methods and technologies of crowd mapping. Participants will decide to use a newly established Ushahidi crowd map deployment or to join the Vacant Central Europe mapping application, according to the established mapping objectives. Participants will learn to submit, edit and organize reports as well as to give additional visibility and publicity to the findings, encouraging the public to participate in the deployment. As a result of the mapping exercise, participants will learn to recognize patterns in the mapped phenomena, helping them to come up with pertinent solutions, informed by examples and good practices from various international locations.

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Discharging Socialist Architecture: Post-war Spaces and Changing Uses in Budapest
Presentation and discussion at TAB Lounge (Pärnu mnt 6), September 5, 7.15pm
KÉK – Hungarian Contemporary Architecture Centre

Photo © Daniel Kováts

The Vacant Budapest project is a research program on vacant urban properties initiated by KÉK. The objective of the program is to raise awareness of the problem and opportunities of vacant real estate, and to create a regulatory framework opening the possibility of the in-between use of properties longtime abandoned, be they publicly or privately owned. Details at lakatlan.kek.org.hu/en

At the TAB Lounge, KÉK will present a specific section of the Vacant Budapest project, focusing on the abandonement and reuse of post-war buildings and complexes. The presentation and discussion will include thoughts about

1. the definition and legacy of socialist architecture, and related projects
2. considerations on spaces and functions going obsolete with the Fall of the Wall
3. a typology and map of post-war buildings and complexes abandoned
4. case studies of reused socialist buildings, interventions, initiatives

Participants:
Daniel Kovacs (KÉK Budapest)
Daniela Patti (Wonderland Platform for European Architecture)
Levente Polyak (KÉK Budapest)

More info at http://lakatlan.kek.org.hu/en/tab-2013/ and at
http://tab.ee/program/lounge/events/tab-lounge-kek-budapest