Hasta La Ideas

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Photographe installé à Londres, John MacLean a parcouru le monde pour photographier les villes natales de ses héros. Dans son livre Hometowns, il nous emmène sur les traces de Takashi Homma, Robert Frank, Robert Rauschenberg et tant d’autres. Le photographe s’est déplacé dans 25 villes sur plusieurs continents pour découvrir les environnements dans lesquels ceux qui l’ont inspiré ont grandi. Une jolie réflexion sur l’influence de l’enfance dans le travail des artistes.

Hometown of Takashi Homma, Ottowa, Tokyo

Hometown of Ed Ruscha, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Hometown of Wassily Kandinsky, Khamovniki, Moscow

Hometown of Richard Long, Bristol, Somerset

Hometown of Robert Frank, Wipkingen, Zurich

Hometown of John Gossage, Staten Island, New York

A UK charity has launched a competition calling for architects to propose alternative living spaces for Romanian migrant workers who are currently forced to set up camp in public parks or underpasses.

The organisation, called Commonweal Housing, wants to urgently find a solution to the “social injustice” of leaving employed migrants with no safe place to reside while they wait for long-term accommodation to become available.

Many of these workers have no option but to create unsanitary camping settlements in public places. These settlements are often unwelcomed by local residents, and can lead to animosity in communities.

“The encampments represent a social injustice on two fronts,” explained Russ Edwards, a trustee for the charity and a driving force behind the competition.

“Firstly, the unsanitary and unsafe living conditions present in the encampments represent a significant social injustice to the individuals living there,” he said, “and secondly, the informal occupation of public open space, represents a social injustice to local residents who become wary of using their local amenity spaces.”

According to recent research, more than 1,500 Romanian immigrants were sleeping rough in London alone last year – largely due to the lack of affordable rental properties in the city.

The Starter For Ten contest asks architects to think of ways that existing structures could be used to facilitate temporary living spaces for these people – similar to the pop-up garage homes proposed back in 2012 by UK firm Levitt Bernstein, or the temporary homes inside unfinished high-rise buildings developed by Bangkok studio All(zone) in 2015.

According to Edwards, architects have a duty to their profession to come up with a solution.

“This is a sizeable group earning casual but regular income almost exclusively from London’s booming domestic scale building industry, which many of us participate in through one way or another,” he said.

“They have found themselves living in encampments of between 3 and 80 people through a mixture of eviction, abuse from unscrupulous landlords, appalling conditions in houses in multiple occupation and prejudice – in short, a lack of choice,” he continued. “But they are resourceful, and want to improve their situation.”

As well as being a trustee for Commonweal Housing, Edwards is also head of design at Pocket London, a property developer that has negotiated smaller space standards in order to create what it calls “starter homes for city makers”.

Pocket has been criticised by some for its approach, which ultimately results in very small homes.

But Edwards insists that variety is the key to reducing the UK’s current housing shortage, and claims this is one of the reasons that led him to get involved in this project.

“There is a growing consensus across the industry that there isn’t a silver-bullet solution to the current housing crisis, and Pocket certainly isn’t pretending to be one, but we offer a really valuable commodity to Londoners: choice,” he said.

“We all know that the tried and tested solutions will not deliver the numbers that we need to mitigate the worst impacts of the crisis. The ‘ladder’ is broken so we need more choice, at every price point and in every tenure to fix it.”

The deadline for submissions to the Starter For Ten competition is 23 June 2017. Shortlisted entrants will then be invited to present their ideas to a jury on 11 July, with a winner set to be announced on 14 July.

Dezeen editor Amy Frearson will be among the judges, along with dRMM co-founder Sadie Morgan, Gensler director Jonathan Breen and Architecture Foundation deputy director Phineas Harper.

The winner will receive £1,500, while runners up will each receive £750 to contribute to their submission costs.

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Anish Kapoor‘s plans to add a roof extension to his studio in London’s Camberwell may be scuppered by complaints that it will block light and create “prison-like” homes for neighbours.

Plans for the corrugated aluminium-covered addition to the artist’s studio by London architecture studio Caseyfierro Architects have been submitted to planners at Southwark Council in March.

But local residents are mounting a campaign against Kapoor‘s extension, which they believe will block out views of the sky and natural light from their homes.

The “upset and dismayed” residents have set up a Change campaign titled Stop Anish Kapoor stealing our light and colour! which has so far attracted 158 signatures opposing the artist’s bid to increase the scale of his studio on Farmers Road.

Objectors say the addition will create a “claustrophobic, prison-like feel, with a real effect on our light and view”.

“Across London residents are being rode rough shod by councils who value commerce over community. This is one example,” reads the campaign page.

“Recently Anish Kapoor has put in a plan to Southwark Council to build another floor on top of his studio that will block the light and view from the back of the properties,” it continues.

“This is the peaceful side of the houses, where you can appreciate the sun when it shines and have a view of the sky over South London. A welcome respite from the busyness of the main road. If you live and work in a city it’s the small thing that is so precious.”

Those challenging the project are suspicious of “foul play” in the planning system, believing special concessions are being made for the artist.

Text on the Change petition page claims planners are meeting behind closed doors to discuss the project and no public consultation has been offered. However, a list of neighbour consultation replies has been included in the planning request.

“Living in a conservation area, us residents have to adhere to strict regulation, aiming to protect the environment where we live with our neighbours,” reads the Change page.

“It doesn’t seem like this applies when a rich and famous artist, who has a light industrial unit bordering our road could potentially ruin this old period London conservation area.”

Lengthly comments opposing the project have also been left on South Council’s planning portal.

Kapoor converted the former brick dairy factory into a studio over 20 years ago. London-based architects Michael Casey and Victoria Fierro carried out several rounds of works on the studio, completing its latest modification to create 3,100 square metres of workspace for the artist last year.

The architects declined to comment on its latest project for Kapoor: “We feel it inappropriate to make any comment at this juncture, the proposal is with the local planning authority who undertake consultation as part of normal planning process,” said Casey.

Kapoor, who was the most popular artist on the inaugural Dezeen Hot List, has attracted considerable attention in recent years for projects including his latticed sculpture for the London Olympics site – which was later controversially converted into Europe’s largest and tallest tunnel slide by Belgian artist Carsten Höller.

The Indian-born British artist also obtained exclusive rights to the world’s blackest black pigment, making him the only person allowed to paint using the colour.

Following the realisation, British artist Stuart Semple created the “world’s pinkest pink” pigment. Semple has made the pigment available to all artists bar Kapoor – who is legally banned from using the colour in his work.

Kapoor has now reportedly got his hands on the bright cerise pigment, posting a provocative picture to his instagram account of his middle finger dipped in the colouring.

Among the artist’s most recent sculptures is a continuously spiralling pool of water installed in the Brooklyn Bridge Park.

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