Published in Architectural Forum, December 1971 | Photo: Leon Kunstenaar
In 1957, the Soviet Union launched a satellite into orbit, thus taking the lead in the “space race.” In response to the “Sputnik crisis,” the West set in motion an unprecedented educational offensive that soon came to feature prominently in the public realm.
Education Shock revisits the decades following the “shock” of the “Sputnik crisis” when the sphere of education expanded on a global scale. As the exhibition and its accompanying publication demonstrate, the rethinking and replanning of learning environments – due to demographics, technology, the Cold War and the social movements culminating in 1968 – permanently changed the educational sphere. In collaboration with artists, academics and architects, curator Tom Holert examines an era of experimentation that is about to be rediscovered as an archive and a resource, which may inform current debates.
Complementing the exhibition, the Education in Concrete project reaches out to eight Berlin schools. As they team up with artists, students will engage with their school buildings of the 1960s and ’70s and speculate about the learning environments of the future.
Exhibition with contributions from Michael Annoff, BARarchitekten (Antje Buchholz, Jürgen Patzak-Poor), Elke Beyer, Sabine Bitter, Antje Buchholz, Arne Bunk, Evan Calder Williams, Fraser McCallum, Filipa César, Inga Danysz, Nuray Demir, Christopher Falbe, Dina Dorothea Falbe, Gregor Harbusch, Marshall Henrichs, Claudia Hummel, Ana Hušman, Jakob Jakobsen, Ana Paula Koury, Monika Mattes, Larry Miller, Maria Helena Paiva da Costa, Silke Schatz, Dubravka Sekulić, Lisa Schmidt-Colinet, Alexander Schmoeger, STREET COLLEGE in cooperation with Käthe Wenzel, Maurice Stein, Alexander Stumm, Oliver Sukrow, Ola Uduku, Clemens von Wedemeyer, Sónia Vaz Borges, Helmut Weber, Florian Zeyfang, Francesco Zuddas
Curated by Tom Holert
Part of The New Alphabet
