"Caring for the Future: Architectural Heritage, Vulnerability and Collectivities"

Project Description

Architectural heritage has obtained increasing value today as humanity, in view of its destructive force, sees itself under radical scrutiny. Architecture connects place and memory, material presence with visions of the future. Yet it is also fragile: not only is it subject to decay, but also to deliberate destruction. Drawing on international case studies, the project examines how societies comprehend themselves through the destruction of architecture: how vulnerability is addressed and comes to be felt in that very moment, and how a particular self-understanding articulates itself in the first place. Within an affective-material concept of the social it seems that architecture wants to tell us how societies, or “humanity”, rely on their more-than-human fellow beings – and how culture, or civilization, and destruction are intrinsically interlinked.

Funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), 03/2022 – 08/2024

Project Chair: Prof. Dr. Susanne Krasmann