3 and 4 December 2019

09.00 - 10.30: Introduction to the Workshop by Maria ZURBUCHEN-HENZ
10.30: Start Workshop
12.30 - 14.00: Lunchbreak (Please bring your lunch yourself – or have lunch in one of the numerous cafés and (student)restaurants in the neighborhood)
14.00 - 17.30: Workshop
17:30: End

Location: Mekano-Space, Faculty of Design Sciences, University of Antwerp        
Tutors: Mariël POLMAN, Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands / Maria ZURBUCHEN-HENZ, Haus der Farbe Zürich, M+B Zurbuchen-Henz Architects Lausanne

The workshop Inside. Experimenting with Polychromy of Interior Rooms focuses on the eminently architectural question of the relationship between volume, space and colour. In order to approach this question in a playful way, the participants will be able to verify some of Le Corbusier’s statements on colour by testing his colour palettes (with colour charts of Le Corbusier designed by Karl Bubenhofer) and working directly on shoe-box sized cardboard models (models from the University of Strasbourg designed in collaboration with Mariël Polman).

In order to explore the relationship between the shape of the room and the possibilities for specific colour palettes and strategies, the cardboard models for the workshop represent both the traditional floor plan with closed, square rooms and the more modern open or free floor plan. As Le Corbusier explained, the invention of the free floor plan, created by separating the functions of load bearing structure and separation of spaces, made it impossible to maintain the tradition of the blue or rose room. Consequently, the plan libre asked for an entirely new colour system.

According to Arthur Rüegg (1994, 1997) Le Corbusier thought that colour can direct or correct the spatial effect on both the psychological and physiological levels of perception. Since Le Corbusier’s consideration that the wall on which the eye lingers constitutes the principal architectural game, colour should not undermine the plastic statement of architecture. On the contrary, the walls as entities have to become vehicles of colour. And if one even wants to sharpen the coloured sensation there are different possibilities, such as in confrontation of different colour planes at the edge of a volume or a space. Working with citations by Le Corbusier, in combination with examples from his architecture, the workshop will give participants knowledge not only on the specific oeuvre of the master but also more generally on the use of colour in interiors.

Knowledge of basic colour mixing is required. ​

3 and 4 December 2019

09.00 - 10.00: Introduction to the Workshop by Tijm LANJOUW and Santje PANDER
10.00: Start Workshop
12.30 - 14.00: Lunchbreak (Please bring your lunch yourself – or have lunch in one of the numerous cafés and (student)restaurants in the neighborhood)
14.00 - 17.30: Workshop
17:30: End

Location: IT Area, Campus Mutsaard, Faculty of Design Sciences, University of Antwerp                       
Tutors: Tijm LANJOUW/ University of Amsterdam and Santje PANDER / University of Amsterdam

The workshop Reconstructing an Interior in the Era of Digitalising. The UNESCO Press Room from 1958 by Gerrit Rietveld as a Case Study will offer exercises with digitalising, related to restoration and reconstruction.

How we perceive colour and gloss is influenced by their surroundings. Influential factors are: light source, placement to contrasting colour, size, surface texture and angle at which they are perceived. Small-scale samples are not always sufficient to analyse these factors. The aim of the case study is to determine whether it is possible to analyse colour and gloss of a reconstruction material by using a 3D digital modelling program. 3D digital modelling could be a helpful tool in decision-making on colour and gloss reconstruction in large-scale interiors.

The question is how to develop a 4D presentation with the right choice of colour with special attention for light, texture and glance? And how to report the reconstruction according to the recommendations of the 'London Charter for the computer-based visualisation on behalf of cultural heritage ' (http://www.londoncharter.org/)? The purpose of the guidelines from 2006 is to ensure that visualizations such as 3D reconstructions are academically transparent. This means that the objectives of the visualization and the creation process – such as choices, uncertainties, and resources used – are described, and preferably published together with the model.

Gerrit Rietveld (1888-1964) designed the UNESCO Press Room for the newly built UNESCO Head Quarters at the Place de Fontenoy in Paris in 1958 as a gift from the Netherlands. The room was designed as a unity in which linoleum on both the furniture and floor played an important role. In the 1980’s the Press Room in the UNESCO building was dismantled. Though the furniture was acquisitioned by the Dutch Agency of Cultural Heritage (RCE) and is currently stored in its depot, the original linoleum floor was not preserved. Still, the RCE intends to exhibit the furniture in combination with a physical reconstruction of the Press Room floor. For that matter the furniture was restored by Jurjen Creman and Santje Pander did scientific research on the linoleum. She brought the project to the 4D Lab to carry out the plan. The reconstruction which provides plenty of information is the topic of the workshop.

Vantages points of the workshop: hands-on workshop, research, restauration, reconstruction, colour, choice of material, 4D reconstruction, replacement. Specific IT knowledge is not required. The program Blender (Open Source), which is the working tool, is free to download.

On this excursion we will visit two projects where the use of colour is chief:
The apartment of artist Jozef Peeters (1895-1960) and House Peeters-Ceurvels designed by architect Gaston Eysselinck (1907-1953), both located in Antwerp. Both visits will be guided.

The private apartment of Jozef Peeters from the mid-20s can be seen as close encounter between art and interior architecture. Peeters created a so-called Gesamtkunstwerk by designing (built-in) furniture and lamps as well as by painting the interiors of his apartment according to his so-called constructivist principles. Through the colouring of walls and ceilings following asymmetric, cubic patterns, he visually neutralized the boundaries of each room. As the interiors and the views from his apartment were often also the subject of his paintings, the difference between interior architecture and art increasingly dissolved.

House Peeters-Ceurvels (1932) by Gaston Eysselinck is an example of modernist architecture in which the use of colour is omnipresent. This house appeared, however, for a long period colourless. Due to profound transformations, it was painted white and lost its initial rich colours. A few years ago this house was restored thoroughly and put back into its original condition. Today this house is a good example of colourful modernism. Owners Lief and Yves De Bont will be our guides and introduce us to the complicated, but very interesting process of colour restauration.

• Prof. dr. Els De Vos, University of Antwerp
• Prof. dr. Ann Verdonck, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB)/Fenikx
• Prof. dr. Zsuzsanna Böröcz, ISC-ID Docomomo International, University of Antwerp, KU Leuven
• Dr. Mariël Polman, ISC-ID Docomomo International, Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands
• Doctoral student Eva Storgaard, ISC-ID Docomomo International, University of Antwerp

Maria ZURBUCHEN-HENZ

Maria Zurbuchen-Henz, architect, is professor at the Haus der Farbe Fachschule für Gestaltung in Handwerk und Architektur in Zurich and lecturer at Bern University of Applied Sciences (Berner Fachhochschule Architektur-Holz-Bau). She studied architecture at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPF / ETH) in Lausanne and Zurich. Since 1987 she is a practising architect in Lausanne where she works together with her partner Bernard Zurbuchen. Her fields of activities include teaching and communication of architectural design and colour concepts.

Mariël POLMAN

Mariël Polman studied architecture at TU Delft, Architectural Paint Research at SRAL in Maastricht, House Painting at Nimeto in Utrecht. She completed a PhD  in architecture at TU Delft. She is currently working as a Colour Specialist at the Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands and as a practising architectural paint researcher at POLMAN Colour & Architecture in Amsterdam. Polman is member of the Docomomo ISC Interior Design. She is specialised in colours of the Modern Movement incl. De Stijl, Paint Industry and Colour Theories.

Nele BERGMANS

Nele Bergmans, architect, studied architecture at KU Leuven Faculty of Architecture in Ghent. After graduating she moved to London where she worked for DRDH Architects.  She is currently working for Caruso St John Architects.

Ann VERDONCK

Ann Verdonck is professor at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (Faculty of Engineering, Department of Architectural Engineering) where she is member of the ReUse research team and responsible for the design studio Habitat & Heritage and the course Image-Form-Colour. After finishing her PhD on architectural paint research of the oeuvre of architect Huib Hoste, Verdonck further specialized in twentieth century finishes in the Belgian context. She publishes on regular bases on her research in national and international journals (Journal of Architectural Conservation, M&L, Erfgoed, etc.) and participates in national and international conferences (SAHC, APR, BRK-APRO, etc.). She is member of the Joint UGent-VUB Research Group ThIS (The Inside Story. Art, Interior Design & Architecture 1750-1950), member of the organizing and scientific committee of the annual seminar Historisch Interieur & design and member of the Royal Commission of Monuments and Sights of the Brussels-Capital Region. As heritage researcher she founded the research studio Fenikx bvba in 2008 (Belgium).

Tijm LANJOUW

Tijm Lanjouw is an archaeologist (ReMA, graduated 2011, University of Groningen) specialized in computer applications in archaeology, with a specific focus on 3D techniques and 3D research methodologies. He is currently employed at the 4D Research Lab, University of Amsterdam, as 3D modeller. The lab facilitates humanities research requiring 3D methodologies, from data acquisition to interpretation and presentation. Tijm is also working on a dissertation at the University of Leiden with as subject the reinterpretation of a Late Bronze Age fortified complex excavated in northern Syria, using 3D methods.

Santje PANDER, University of Amsterdam

Santje Pander graduated in 2018 in Conservation and Restoration of Cultural Heritage at the University of Amsterdam (UvA), where she is currently employed as a Post-Master trainee specializing in restoration of historic interiors, with a specific interest in post-war architecture. Her Master thesis research was on the 1958 UNESCO Press Room designed by Gerrit Rietveld. In the spring of 2018, she was granted the 4D Research Award from the UvA. This made it possible to continue digital reconstruction research of the UNESCO Press Room in collaboration with the 4D Research Lab.

Yves DE BONT

Yves De Bont graduated as an architect at Sint-Lucas School of Architecture in Brussels in 1971. In his career as an independent architect, until 1998, he designed the social housing estate den Brand and led the restoration of the seventeenth century Pannenhuis in Merkplas. From 1971 to 2009, he was an art teacher at the Heilig-Grafinstituut in Turnhout. As an expert in regional architecture, he curated the exhibitions 100 years of living in Turnhout, Paul Neefs residences 1958-1983 and de Turnhoutse School of which also he (co-)authored the exhibition catalogues. For the architecture association Ar-Tur, he set the documentary film Domestic Modernism on track. He has published in architecture magazines and in the National Biographical Dictionary.

Veronique BOONE

Veronique Boone is associate professor at the Faculty of Architecture La Cambre Horta at the Université Libre de Bruxelles in Belgium (ULB). She lectures on architectural history, theory and criticism as well as on the conservation of twentieth century architecture. She studied architecture and history of architecture at Ghent University, ENSA Paris-La Villette and La Sorbonne in Paris. She realised her PhD at the ENSAP Lille/Université de Lille and the ULB, on Le Corbusier and the mediation of architecture by film and television, for which she received the Prize attributed by the Fondation Le Corbusier for “la recherche patiente” (patient research) in 2017 and for which she was nominated at the Académie d’Architecture in November 2019. Her research focuses on the modalities of representation and the mediation of modern architecture, the intellectual histories on architecture and the complementary activities of architecture such as pedagogy and construction history. She publishes regularly on these topics and is an author for Belgian and international architectural magazines on contemporary architecture. She is also a board member of DOCOMOMO Belgium.

Els DE VOS

Els De Vos, engineering architect and spatial planner, is associate professor at the Faculty of Design Sciences at the University of Antwerp, where she lectures in the field of architectural history, architectural theory and interior design. Her PhD on the architectural, social and gender-differentiated mediation of dwelling in 1960s–1970s Belgian Flanders has been published by the University Press Leuven (2012). She has co-edited several different volumes in the field of architecture, including Van academie tot universiteit [From Academy to University] (2013), Theory by design (2013) and Reuse of Modernist Buildings. A Case Study Handbook (2019). She was co-awarded the BWMSTR label 2016 Award by the Flemish Government Architect. She published in several national and international journals, including Technology and Culture, Home Cultures and The Journal of Interior Design. She is a member of the scientific committee of Inner – The interior architecture magazine. She coordinated the Erasmus+ project Re-Use of Modernist Buildings RMB at the University of Antwerp.

Zsuzsanna BÖRÖRCZ

Zsuzsanna Böröcz is a musicologist, and art and architectural historian. She obtained her PhD from the KU Leuven in 2004 with a comparative and contextual study on postwar stained-glass windows. Since then she has been teaching diverse subjects in art, design and architectural theory at several universities. Currently she holds a position of guest-professor at the Faculty of Architecture KU Leuven Belgium. She is affiliated as a researcher with the KU Leuven Department of Architecture (http://www.a2i-kuleuven.be/team/zsuzsanna-borocz/) and the University of Antwerp Henry van de Velde Research Group. She is Vice-President of Docomomo Belgium and co-chair of the Docomomo International Scientific Committee on Interior Design. Zsuzsanna is also a jury member for the Flemish Ministry of Culture Decree on Architecture and Design. Her interest fields and publication subjects are interiors and design issues in the context of heritage conservation and craftsmanship in the 19th- and 20th-century. In 2018-19 she wrote ‘Exploration on Design in Flanders. A Sector Analysis’, with Dr. Annelies Thoelen, commissioned by the Flemish Ministry of Culture. 

Eva STORGAARD

Eva Storgaard studied architecture at The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, Copenhagen, Denmark. She is teaching in the master program of interior architecture at the Faculty of Design Sciences, University of Antwerp and wrote a dissertation entitled The Architecture of Danish Modern. Empiricism. Craft. Organicism (2019). Storgaard is the co-author of Pieter De Bruyne 1931-1987. Pionier van het postmoderne (2012) and Morphology of Interiors. Fragments of Space Examined (2019). Additionally she is member of the Erasmus+ project Re-Use of Modernist Buildings (RMB). As secretary of DOCOMOMO International Specialist Committee of Interior (ISC/I) she has a special interest in modernist interiors.