"The exhibition at the Hochbunker on Blumenstraße brings artist Nicolas Grospierre into dialogue with the architects Fthenakis Ropee about their engagement with modernist buildings. Both are united by their passion for this era of optimism and faith in architecture, its pursuit of social justice and the best possible living conditions for humanity. Grospierre takes up these unachieved goals of modernism, yet his photomontages and objects of imaginary modernist structures and idealized urban landscapes are unencumbered by the flaws of reality. Fthenakis Ropee, in addition to documenting and communicating, are primarily concerned with the transformation of these buildings. They develop contemporary design and functional solutions for the surviving architecture of the period."
Nicola Borgmann, accompanying text to the announcement of the exhibition.
The Hochbunker from 1941 in the immediate vicinity of the Schrannenhalle is an often overlooked relic from the National Socialist era. Like a shadow, its morbid aura lies over the optimistic title of the exhibition. On 5 floors, the large-scale, architecture-related works of Nicolas Grospierre mingle with images and models of our imagined and built projects. In addition to images and models of our projects, facsimiles of various working documents from our office are displayed on long tables designed by us: Working drawings, sketches, calculations, construction site photos show excerpts of the development process and the conceptual levels behind the buildings shown.
Munich 2018-2019
Fthenakis Ropee in collaboration with Nicolas Grospierre, Warsaw
