Architecture on Display is a research initiative by Aaron Levy and William Menking that consists of interviews with each of the living directors of the Venice Biennale for Architecture.

"Une mine d'or à parcourir encore et toujours, un de ces livres qui fournira aux bâtisseurs actuels et futurs de notre monde tout le savoir dont ils ont besoin pour aborder les questions actuelles et celles auxquelles ils seront confrontés". ArchDaily Architecture is a compelling mixture of stability and flux. In its solid forms, time and space collide, amalgamating distant influences, elements that have been around for over 5, 000 years and others that were (re-)invented yesterday. Elements of Architecture focuses on the fragments of the rich and complex architectural collage. Window, facade, balcony, corridor, fireplace, stair, escalator, elevator : The book seeks to excavate the micro-narratives of building detail. The result is no single history, but rather the web of origins, contaminations, similarities, and differences in architectural evolution, including the influence of technological advances, climactic adaptation, political calculation, economic contexts, regulatory requirements, and new digital regimes. Derived from Koolhaas' exhaustive and much-lauded exhibition at the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale, this is an essential toolkit to understanding the pieces, parts, and fundamentals that comprise structure around the globe. Designed by Irma Boom, the book contains essays from Rem Koolhaas, Stephan Trueby, Manfredo di Robilant, and Jeffrey Inaba; interviews with Werner Sobek and Tony Fadell (of Nest); and an exclusive photo essay by Wolfgang Tillmans.

Museums are among the iconic buildings of the twenty-first century, as remarkable for their architectural diversity as for the variety of collections they display. But how does the architecture of museums affect our experience as visitors? This book proposes that by seeing space as common ground between architecture and museology, and so between the museum building and its display, we can illuminate the individuality of each museum and the distinctive experience it offers - for example, how some museums create a sense of personal exploration, while others are more intensely didactic, and how the visit in some cases is transformed into a spatial experience and in other cases into a more social event. The book starts with an overview of the history of museum buildings and display strategies, and a discussion of theoretical and critical approaches. It then focuses on specific museums as in-depth case studies, and uses methods of spatial analysis to look at the key design choices available to architects and curators, and their effects on visitors’ behaviour. Theoretically grounded, methodologically original, and richly illustrated, this book will equip students, researchers and professionals in the fields of architecture, museum studies, curating, exhibition design, and cultural studies, with a guide for studying museums and a theoretical framework for their interpretation.

Why do we organise architecture exhibitions? Conventional shows - contexts displaying documentation, technical drawings, three-dimensional models, photographs and videos, frameworks where sketches and drawings are treated as if they were "paintings", models as if they were "sculptures" and photographs idealising what they depict within strangely uninhabited landscapes - are contrasted by practices of display that focus on a different kind of investigation and offer an uncharacteristic way of involving the public with the show by means of spatial solutions within the exhibition space. The attitude that characterises the traditional approach to architecture exhibitions inevitably generates a distinction between the visitors that can read and interpret the displayed objects and those who cannot. Hardly any empathy is generated between the exposed objects and the subjects viewing them; often these kinds of exhibitions only try to solve the problem of presenting objects that cannot be transferred into exhibitions spaces. In the last years we have assisted to the diffusion of exhibitions characterised by different approaches, i.e. shows in which architectural production is presented as an issue which is integrated in a broader critical context and assumes a central role from an unexpected point of view, or exhibitions that concentrate on an emotional involvement of visitors who are not confronted with a specific object and its characteristics, but with the transmission of an experience capable of establishing an intense relationship between the public and the content of the show. In order to explore these issues, this conference brings together critical contributions related to both the conception and the construction of contemporary architecture exhibitions.

This book records a critical discussion of individual approaches to the representation of space in a museum through a series of conversations. Architecture and design exhibitions have long been important public sites of broadcasting, experimentation, position-taking, and the interrogation of fundamental aspects of the designed environment. Just as individual exhibitions have constituted key benchmarks within the disciplinary history of architecture, the representation and display of space through exhibitions has operated historically as a crucial medium for shaping and embodying broader cultural attitudes toward the design of the built world. In recent years, the specific formats and challenges of exhibiting architecture and design, both built and speculative, have often been used as critical devices for identifying, communicating, and convening the public around shared matters of concern. These have increasingly included urgent questions of equity and justice, labor, gender, race, class, community, and lifestyle in relation to spatial issues of density, economy, policy, infrastructure, climate, and sustainability. Futures of the Architectural Exhibition records a discussion of critical approaches to the representation of architecture through conversations with seven contemporary curators working inside and outside of the museum. Mario Ballesteros (Archivo Diseño y Arquitectura, Mexico City), Giovanna Borasi (Canadian Center for Architecture, Montreal), Ann Lui (Future Firm, Chicago), Ana Miljački (Critical Broadcasting Lab, MIT), Zoë Ryan (ICA, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia), Martino Stierli (Museum of Modern Art, New York), and Shirley Surya (M+, Hong Kong) speculate on the specific challenges and potentials of exhibiting space.

This volume completes the documentation of the planning, design, and construction of the Getty Center begun in The Getty Center (1991). Designed by Richard Meier and Partners, the Getty Center sits atop a stunning 110-acre hilltop in west Los Angeles and is the new home for the Museum, the five Institutes, and the Grant Program that make up the J. Paul Getty Trust. The book includes a series of essays that underscore the challenges faced by architect, contractor, and owner working collaboratively. A chronology identifies the key dates and events in the design and construction process. Extensively illustrated with photographs by several accomplished photographers, site drawings from Richard Meier and Partners, and Robert Irwin's drawings of the Central Gardens, the book presents readers with an insider's view of the making of the Getty Center.

A comprehensive and fascinating look at the history of the Museum of Modern Art’s Architecture and Design Department under the leadership of the influential curator Arthur Drexler. Arthur Drexler (1921-1987) served as the curator and director of the Architecture and Design Department at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) from 1951 until 1986—the longest curatorship in the museum’s history. Over four decades he conceived and oversaw trailblazing exhibitions that not only reflected but also anticipated major stylistic developments. Although several books cover the roles of MoMA’s founding director, Alfred Barr, and the department’s first curator, Philip Johnson, this is the only in-depth study of Drexler, who gave the department its overall shape and direction. During Drexler’s tenure, MoMA played a pivotal role in examining the work and confirming the reputations of twentieth-century architects, among them Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier, Richard Neutra, Marcel Breuer, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Exploring unexpected subjects—from the design of automobiles and industrial objects to a reconstruction of a Japanese house and garden—Drexler’s boundary-pushing shows promoted new ideas about architecture and design as modern arts in contemporary society. The department’s public and educational programs projected a culture of popular accessibility, offsetting MoMA’s reputation as an elitist institution. Drawing on rigorous archival research as well as author Thomas S. Hines’s firsthand experience working with Drexler, Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art analyzes how MoMA became a touchstone for the practice and study of midcentury architecture.