God jul

arkkitehtuurin osasto

Gisle is back from Oulu where he's been teaching a student workshop on building in the high north at the department of architecture.

Focal Point Biedjovággi

We'll be teaching a master studio called Focal Point Biedjovággi at the Tromsø Academy of Landscape and Territorial Studies, starting January 6. There might still be some places left for interested and committed students, then contact studieinfo@aho.no - today..!

If you want to print, cut and fold your own booklet you can download the pdf here:

70°N instants

70°N is now on instagram.

Follow us there, we are @70N_arkitektur and are using hashtags #70N_ontour / #chez_70N / #by_70N / #70N_arkitektur / #facadeloving / #reflectionobsession etc.

Starting the 70°N instagram experience with a recent trip to Milan:

there might also soon be insta- and regram pics from Copenhagen:

trips to London:

or Moscow:

and other travels, to Vienna or Vietnam for instance:

some everyday life in Tromsø:

in the landscape:

possibly some 70°N architecture:

office life and projects:

and more - so, see you at instagram!

visitor #13 - footnote #9

Our work, footnote #9, is now published on the web-page in progress there is a visitor #13. The beautiful pics are by Jann Lipka.

r/evolutionary narratives - associative stories from the albino/melanino animals in the State Darwin Museum at the 5th Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art

r a k e t a, a free flying free falling, interdisciplinary, collaborative institute based in Stockholm, invited us to take part in the exhibition 'Visitor #13 / Nursing Nature, Nature Nursing - footnotes in the Darwin Museum' at the 5th Moscow Biennale of Contemporary Art, along with an international group of artists.

Our piece is called r/evolutionary narratives - associative stories from the albino/melanino animals and consists of a printed, transparent, adhesive film mounted on the albino/melanino animals’ showcase. Our work includes a mapping of the exposed albino/melanino animals: their origins, their dates of life and death, their way into the museum. All this information and yet other linked to facts, myths, scientific ideas and stories around the exposed species have found their place in the graphic representation.

Darwin’s Tree of life evolves into a Rhizome of life - a non-hierarchic system, where inheritance occurs in all directions, vertically and laterally, with innumerable crossings and interconnections.

There is neither a beginning nor an end to the mystery of existence. In a Pattern of Thought, any point can lead to yet another, following lines of flight that lead far away from the initial point of randomness.

By following and cultivating the imaginary with an open attitude, and freely connect facts, myths and fiction, new associative narrations form.

Two black wolves in Moscow can take us on an imaginary journey far away from their home in the Darwin museum. Their tales of historical events, scientific ideas, geographic localities and personal destinies form a complex cartography. As old fairy tales and myths served a mission in an unenlightened society, these new narrations open for interpretations into a present reality, and the dichotomy linked to valuation of diversity and otherness.

Some pics from the opening: B+M of 70°N together with the r a k e t a team, the State Darwin team, museum director Anna Klukina, counsellor for cultural affairs at Sweden’s embassy in Moscow Mårten Frankby, and visitors.

new, new, new!

So, lots of news this autumn:

- new web-page, still under construction so..

..some things will be altered
..a few things will be adjusted
..a lot of things will be added

..but, WELCOME to our new site!

- new location, also here we're in the process of altering, adjusting and adding..

..but again, WELCOME to our new studio in the Karl Johan building at Grønnegata 38-46!

- and as you can see this blog is also in change, we'll see how it ends up this time..

move

Tromsø Academy of Landscape and Territorial Studies

We are happy that the Tromsø Academy of Landscape and Territorial Studies, TACL, is now officially opened.

After a very nice opening ceremony we were allowed to pay a visit in the soon to be finished new premises of the TACL program in the Mack building.

Some of the people behind the implementation of the Tromsø Academy of Landscape and Territorial Studies at the premises of the new master program:

Gisle Løkken (architect at 70°N and teacher at TACL), Janike Kampevold Larsen (Associate Professor at the Institute of Urbanism and Landscape and coordinator for TACL), Karl Otto Ellefsen (rector at AHO), Ulf Christensen (prev. rector of HiTø) and Alice Labadini (PhD research fellow at AHO and teacher at TACL).

And we are looking forward to meeting the students from all over the world at the master studio Focal Point Biedjovággi that we will teach this winter.

from Russia with love

Magdalena is spending some hot summer days at the Winzavod Centre for contemporary Art in Moscow giving a lecture and tutoring at a workshop. Together with representatives from the regional and educational ministries, the World Bank, developers and other international architects and experts there was also a highly interesting press-conference given on the theme of the future for russian kindergartens: existing situation, problems, experiences, hopes, influences, demands, possibilities etc..

This was of course also a good opportunity to pay a visit to the construction site of our collaboration project with Krost: a kindergarten / school in the neighborhood of Khoroshevo-Mnevniki where we have been consulting the russian developer to find new solutions and possibilities to both interpret and challenge the very strict and archaic russian building code. The kindergarten / school is to be finished in just a few weeks, and ready to welcome the children and staff..!

contested landscapes

This year's Arctic Frontiers Landscape conference Contested Landscapes - Lost Ecologies brought excellent lectures and interesting discussions.

Some pics from the final discussion with, from left to right: Janike Kampevold Larsen, Siri Hermansen, Kari Anne Bråthen, Kjartan Fløgstad,William L Fox, Julia Martin and Gisle Løkken.
At the top: Michael Bravo and Julia Martin during their talks.

contested landscapes - lost ecologies

Arctic Frontiers 2013 - side event / 24 January, 0900 - 1700 / University of Tromsø, UB 132

The intention of the conference is to be a counter-force to the prevailing forces and to encourage a holistic approach to Circumpolar landscapes

Welcome
09.00 - Janike Kampevold Larsen (Norway) - Future North


Session I
09.30 - William L. Fox (USA) - The Art of the Anthropocene
10.15 - Kjartan Fløgstad (Norway) - Abandoned Utopias - Mining Towns at the End of the World

Coffee break - 11.00

11.15 - Mattias Åhrén (Sweden/Norway) - ‘Arctic Frontiers’
- A biased title revealing that the Arctic landscape is viewed through a non-Arctic lens
12.00 - Julia Martin (Germany/UK) - Revealing human-nonhuman ecologies through artistic fieldwork, speculative documentation, and the hyperextension of objects. Two case studies from West Greenland and East Iceland

Lunch - 12.45

Session II
13.45 - Michael Bravo (UK) - The Freedoms of Navigation in the Archaic and the Modern
14.30 - Kari Anne Bråthen (Norway) - Tundra landscapes - pristine or cultural?
15.15 - Siri Hermansen (Norway) - The Economy of Survival

Coffee break - 16.00

Concluding discussion - 16.15
moderator Gisle Løkken

Registrate here!

More information at The Oslo School of Architecture and Design (AHO) and Arctic Frontiers. Concept and organization: Janike Kampevold Larsen (AHO) & Gisle Løkken (70°N arkitektur)

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, from all of us to all our friends, collaborators - and to all of you patient blog readers out there!

We know it has been a little quiet on the blog lately - this is not due to low activity at the office, rather the opposite..!

We'll try to put some info up soon on what we have been doing (projects, books, babies, competitions, conferences, travels etc) - and of course what's coming up..