With architectural production becoming ever more beholden to the needs of capital and the building industry, the role of the architect is changing. This series of events and lectures, held at the RA, address the critical issues informing architecture today.

Image caption: KA300 Pavilion, Karlsruhe, Germany, 2015, by J. MAYER H / Photo Frank Dinger

Architecture and Freedom

The work of the German architect Jürgen Mayer H stands at the intersection of architecture, design and digital technology. His practice operates across scale and typology: from master-planning to buildings, product design to art.

For Mayer, emerging media and materials allow a fundamental rethinking of how we understand space and the potential for new forms of human activity and communication. Mayer kicked off the season with a discussion of his work and its reflection on the potential for architecture to act as a conduit for freedom through participation and social interactivity.

Image caption: Jürgen Mayer H © Joseph Wolfgang Ohlert

Architecture and freedom: Jürgen Mayer H

Architect and theorist, Patrik Schumacher, considers the various parameters for architectural practice today. One of architecture’s foremost designers and polemicists, Schumacher is a director of Zaha Hadid Architects, which he joined in 1988, and is involved in all the practice’s projects, playing an active role in each phase of design development.

He has taught at architecture schools across the world and has been co-director of the Design Research Laboratory at the Architectural Association since 1996. His writings have frequently appeared in print and across the media. In this lecture, Schumacher reflects on the range of issues and agendas that “burden” architecture in the twenty-first century.

Image caption: Patrik Schumacher / Courtesy Zaha Hadid Architects

Architecture and freedom: Patrik Schumacher

In this podcast, Reiner de Graaf reflects on architecture’s different roles in today’s globalised world. An architect, academic and writer, de Graaf is a partner of OMA and director of AMO, the practice’s think tank and research studio based in Rotterdam. AMO’s work extends beyond architecture to encompass media, politics, sociology, renewable energy, technology, fashion, curating, publishing, and graphic design.

In addition to his work for AMO, De Graaf is responsible for a number of the OMA’s building and master-planning projects in Europe, Russia, and the Middle East. In this lecture, de Graaf considers architecture’s social, economic and political role in today’s globalised world.

Image caption: Reinier de Graaf © Ekaterina Izmestieva/ Strelka Institute

Architecture and freedom: Reinier De Graaf

Spaces of freedom are typically seen as synonymous with public space, where freedom of assembly and expression are inherent rights. Increasingly, though, public space, especially in cities, is being eroded by private, often commercially driven forces. At the same time, we have seen the rise of the digital realm heralded as a new free and democratic space for self-expression and debate.

This, however, is also under attack through both corporate and state-sponsored surveillance and data collection. While services on the Internet are “free” to use, the business models that sustain them depend on the collecting and commercialisation of our every digital interaction.

Image caption: Granary Square, Kings Cross © Monica Wells/Alamy

Architecture and Freedom: Spaces Of Freedom

In the final lecture of the series, Farshid Moussavi discusses architecture’s function as an agent in shaping everyday life. For Moussavi, architecture “produces platforms for the way people engage with uses of buildings” – an idea which she has explored through practice, education and research.

A co-founder of Foreign Office Architects, which won international attention with the Yokohama Ferry Terminal, Moussavi established her own practice in 2011, which has since completed the acclaimed Cleveland Museum of Contemporary Art in Ohio. Moussavi is Professor in Practice of Architecture at Harvard University Graduate School of Design, and has published a number of books deriving from her research and teaching.

Image caption: Farshid Moussavi RA © Dan Stevens

Architecture and freedom: Farshid Moussavi

World renowned designer Sir Paul Smith discusses his humble beginnings, what inspires him, and the lessons he's learnt throughout his career.

Paul Smith: finding inspiration in the everyday and the extraordinary

Mali Morris discusses her latest exhibition and display at the RA, as well as her career and practice, with author and poet Martha Kapos.

Acclaimed artist Mali Morris RA focuses on the expressive possibilities of abstract painting. Her work draws on many sources but constantly explores how colour can structure light and space.

Mali Morris in conversation with Martha Kapos

Catch up with this panel discussion featuring political satirist Steve Bell, artist Bedwyr Williams and artist duo John Wood and Paul Harrison as they explore humour and satire in art, discussing how it's impacted today’s contemporary art world.

Making a mockery: exploring humour and satire in art

As part of our 'When Science Meers Art' series Mathematician Professor Marcus du Sautoy OBE FRS, artist Conrad Shawcross RA and BBC presenter Samira Ahmed discuss how experimentation, curiosity and creative thinking are central to both science and sculpture. Download slides from this lecture: https://roy.ac/gh4d4

Marcus Du Sautoy & Conrad Shawcross RA in conversation

Artist and singer/songwriter Michael Stipe talks about his life-long passion for photography and its potential to produce a defining image of our times.

Michael Stipe In Conversation

Our panel, chaired by art critic, writer & curator, Sacha Craddock, and including Alistair Hudson, Director of the Whitworth and Mariam Zulfiqar, Deputy Director and Chief Curator at UP Projects, questions where sculpture is best exhibited and what impact sculptures have on the spaces they are presented in. Do sculptures act as catalysts for social change and can people connect better with a place when it contains a work of art?

Part of 'Where language ends: Antony Gormley’s discourse series'.

What is sculpture good for?

Antony Gormley discusses his career spanning over 40 years and explores how his series of installations within the RA’s Main Galleries encouraged visitors to slow down and become aware of their own bodies and environment.

Part of 'Where language ends: Antony Gormley’s discourse series'.

Anthony Gormley in conversation with Director of the Whitechapel Gallery, Iwona Blazwick

Theoretical astrophysicist, Priya Natarajan, joins Semiconductor, the artist duo Ruth Jarman and Joe Gerhardt, to discuss how artists contribute to our understanding of the world around and the relationship between physics, cosmology and art.

Part of 'Where language ends: Antony Gormley’s discourse series'.

Understanding space through art

Anthropologist and director of the documentary 'Inside Australia', Hugh Brody discusses how geology, anthropology and humankind’s connection with the land are represented in Gormley’s work.

Hugh Brody on his documentary 'Inside Australia' and the work of Antony Gormley

Recorded during our exhibition Lucien Freud: The Self-portraits, Tracey Emin CBE RA and David Dawson(Lucien Freud's assistant and model) discuss their memories of the artist, as well as Emin and Freud’s shared ability to innovate, provoke and soul-search.

Tracy Emin and David Dawson In Conversation

Subscribe for art and ideas. We host conversations with artists, architects and other leading creatives – and we've just posted podcasts from recent Festival of Ideas. Enjoy.

Architecture and freedom: Reinier De Graaf

Royal Academy of Arts

Related tracks