Amongst these is an essay by Peter Cook, a national treasure himself, on the British Pavilion. He refers to its prime location on the axis at the top of a gentle hill, its colonial-era veranda overlooking the rest of the Giardini, flanked by France and Germany, and fondly imagines himself dozing on a deckchair with a cool gin and tonic. With no little affection he describes the British outpost at Venice as a lovable pet past its prime. He uses the word "fusty".
And so, to a backdrop of such damning faint praise, the British architectural presentation at Venice arrives, or rather takes away.
The title of the show, Venice Takeaway: Ideas to Change British Architecture, is a tricky premise. Ostensibly it's a straightforward ideas competition designed to bring together some of the most sparkling, useful, practical, productive innovations from around the world and present them under the roof of British architecture. An effort to harangue the doddery establishment into getting some good ideas again. To make the pavilion something useful and productive beyond the walls of a building in Venice.
Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) director Patrick Schumacher, writing the foreword of the catalogue, supports the approach. He complains about British architectural practice and how its surrounding infrastructure lacks vitality, that there are low horizons and that the nation is in general risk-averse. He welcomes the outward approach, the adventurous spirit proposed by the curators.
And, not by chance, a few of those young talented practitioners have made their way into Venice Takeaway.
While rich in content, the pavilion as a whole seemed to resonate more with the agenda of the British Council — striving for international collaborations and connections — than with a rigorous position or comment on contemporary British architecture
The exhibit is based on Caochangdi, a creative cluster and dense, dusty urban village in north Beijing, most known for being home to Ai Weiwei and for advertising itself as a "new socialist village". It also forms the heart of Beijing's forthcoming design week.
