#93 - Architektin in Europa und Westafrika: Welche Architektur wird erzählt – und welche nicht? - Jeanne Autran-Edorh

00:00:00: Welcome to the ninety-third episode of Studying To Build, The Baunettes Campus Aluminium Podcast presented by Gira.

00:00:07: I'm Kerstin Kunighardt and my guest today is Jeanne Autran Edor.

00:00:11: Let's go!

00:00:12: Welcome to the Bonnet Campus Alumni Podcast, Jeanne Autran Edor.

00:00:17: You are a Franco Togolese architect, curator and lecturer as well as co-founder of Studio Neda an interdisciplinary architecture design, curatorial and research practice based in Berlin & Lomé The main capital of West African country Togo.

00:00:38: You studied architecture in several countries, most of the time France and Marseille.

00:00:44: How did this international education shape your view on architecture?

00:00:51: Perfect introduction!

00:00:52: Thank you so much.

00:00:53: So after studying in Marseilles and Lisbon Portugal I had decided to continue opening my architectural knowledge view and network.

00:01:09: So I started working in a few places across Europe, but... ...I always had in mind especially during my studies that i would at some point get to the African continent uh-to work on architecture there.

00:01:29: And this is something that have been missing quite a lot through my studies especially around architectural history and the way architecture in Europe is pretty much Eurocentric, really focused on specifics.

00:01:53: period, but especially in a geographical area that stays around the Western world.

00:02:00: So I had the question when did you realize it's heavily dependent on local conditions and Eurocentric?

00:02:08: You realized during your studies?

00:02:09: obviously then

00:02:10: Yes absolutely because i remember asking like architectural history teacher that was telling us all those fascinating stories about the Quattrocento in Italy and all of that.

00:02:26: But what I found a bit problematic at the time, or i went to discuss with him asking but why are we starting there like is there not architecture before, is there not architecture around?

00:02:39: Like why do we say that architecture started when Brunelleschi put a word on to the profession and his answer kind of stood me at time because he said like well.

00:02:56: Of course In a lot of places, there is vernacular architecture.

00:03:04: There's lots of knowledge but unfortunately I haven't studied that myself so i'm not able to teach it you.

00:03:11: So like...I kind have seen this loop into the transmission of knowledge That was missing already.

00:03:23: Yeah very self-centered The European way of teaching architecture.

00:03:28: Your practice was in Europe mainly at first.

00:03:32: You have worked in Switzerland, the Netherlands France and Germany at internationally renowned firms such as Herzogen de Meuron, Atelier Jean Nouvel & Kiri Architecture.

00:03:44: What did you take away from these very different office cultures?

00:03:58: people, like from a lot of different backgrounds to work on projects together.

00:04:04: So I really had the feeling too that was learning a lot in those big offices especially at Herzog and Nomeron in Basel From micro-workers Everyone coming with different backgrounds And working together on project.

00:04:21: Yeah these are very international offices

00:04:24: Absolutely Very International.

00:04:26: but once again Africa is a bit excluded from what we call international.

00:04:32: So like most of the time it's yeah, let's say that its covering North American continent Europe and part Asia And then We are calling it International.

00:04:45: but actually Most of the global south is not really represented in this crowd and also in the location of the projects.

00:04:53: so I guess these quests For me of applying my learnings and ideas about design to African geographies, I like continue to grow even working in those international settings.

00:05:12: Francis Querrier plays a big role for the African architecture.

00:05:15: I mean, to say African architectures of course little bit ridiculous because it's a big continent but he does play a big roll.

00:05:24: and at Querrier Architecture you let major public projects such as The Benin National Assembly And Thomas Sankara Memorial which is still in progress.

00:05:35: i think What did this project management experience means?

00:05:40: A lot, I think both of those projects.

00:05:43: they are still on construction today.

00:05:48: Yeah yeah the National Assembly like it's closer to completion but It was a state building its really representative political building that part of building national identity for Benin.

00:06:10: So those were really important projects.

00:06:17: For me, they first collaborated with the two governments or associations around the civic project in terms of network and developing a working methodology for big-scale projects but using local material and resources.

00:06:41: As well as keeping those, like especially for the National Alliance family you know we had to keep also international standard of what the client would like to see a stand out in the building because it was working with several politicians and all deputies that will spend a lot but still trying to make it a part of local culture, right?

00:07:13: What convinced the government?

00:07:17: give us that project?

00:07:18: because there was competition.

00:07:21: I think what this idea or reference for cultural figure like building is based on the idea of l'arbre à palabre which is the Palavre tree and place of reunion around the biggest tree of the village often, which is in traditional culture.

00:07:43: In Benin or more largely West Africa as well as the civic court and a bit of parliament.

00:07:52: so it's really like a major political but also civic and communal space that we like try to reproduce in a more formal manner of course.

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00:08:48: Yeah, very identifying architecture then also.

00:08:53: So you later co-founded Studio Nader.

00:08:56: together with the curator and author Fabiola Büchelle established an interdisciplinary practice.

00:09:03: how did this come about?

00:09:06: Um so that's something.

00:09:09: yeah it is really essential to have a whole practice.

00:09:13: the interdisciplinary part also regretted a little bit in architecture offices and even like big office that most of the staff is actually architects.

00:09:28: Like there's not lot collaboration between the fields of architecture, other artistic or production field which I find a pity because i found it such key for collaboration enabling work.

00:09:46: So when we started collaborating with Fabiola, it became quite clear that we were really complementary in our skills.

00:09:58: That it worked very well and is something quite unique and rare... ...that you want to

00:10:05: cultivate.".

00:10:06: That's great!

00:10:07: Your motivation was to work.

00:10:09: interdisciplinary?

00:10:11: the main point.

00:10:13: So with who do you work together, with craftsman artists?

00:10:16: You said and which group is important to your designers of course...

00:10:21: Yeah all that but simply also just our collaboration with Fabiola and I is interdisciplinary by itself because she's into writing and creating parts And i'm doing design right.

00:10:36: so it almost like for each project.

00:10:39: we are already a team where we kind of know what will be the split-off work on a project.

00:10:48: And then from there, I would love to collaborate with experts and especially craft people in Togo.

00:10:57: like most of the scenography or projects that have been produced We've done it really in collaboration starting with potters and ceramists.

00:11:11: That's a craft that I have also some knowledge of because my mother is a ceramicist, so it needs to be preserved in Togo.

00:11:28: like there is incredible knowledge but its been replaced by the rise And it's like, it's really sad because he always seems to be the last generation of women potter that are still producing this craft.

00:11:51: Wow!

00:11:52: That is

00:11:53: crazy... The last generation?

00:11:55: Probably.. Because in the next generations don't want to learn from their elder anymore because it's not a lucrative craft.

00:12:03: Yeah,

00:12:04: I can imagine that.

00:12:05: so there is no really of future in the sense.

00:12:11: but you bring this all together.

00:12:12: studio neda does not view architecture as an isolated discipline as he described it But has a practice with political social and economic implications.

00:12:23: How could this approach be translated into concrete projects?

00:12:28: There is a lot of aspect and, of course it's not like the method that replicated exactly the same for each project.

00:12:36: It's more to come into a project... ...and see what could be the collaborative framework around projects as possible?

00:12:47: And how can we connect...?

00:12:54: with local actors, no?

00:12:57: Like local in that sense like around the crafts in Togo.

00:13:02: but also how can every project we are working on benefit the local community that we're working with as well as international audiences.

00:13:15: I'm thinking for instance walking like we created the first Togolese pavillon at Venice Biennale in twenty-five.

00:13:25: Of course, I wanted to ask you about that!

00:13:29: So i can maybe take this project as an example?

00:13:33: Yeah please yeah...

00:13:35: Maybe the aim because it was the first project was a bit too document to archive and give a first documentation of Togoli's architecture.

00:13:49: I'd exist what still exists and what is in danger, in terms of conservation.

00:13:55: You curated the first ever Togo Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale last year, twenty-twenty five?

00:14:02: And that title was Considering Togo's Architectural Heritage.

00:14:06: Yes

00:14:06: So our listeners know it.

00:14:09: Yes, absolutely!

00:14:11: Please tell more about how did you approach presenting Togo's architectural heritage?

00:14:16: It is a big responsibility

00:14:18: Absolutely but that why we really see as only the first step into process.

00:14:23: Yeah maybe this challenge was also kind of double audience And so in one hand, it was about showing to an international audience what exists.

00:14:37: In a country like Togo that's not well known in the European views.

00:14:43: also we were only subside and African pavilion in the Biennale that year.

00:14:51: So in that sense kind of responsibility for representing the architecture, part of a continent.

00:15:01: And we must

00:15:02: say Togo to those who don't know is very small.

00:15:05: It's

00:15:05: pretty small.

00:15:06: but what I'm always surprised in Germany because i've been living in Berlin for seven years that it not well known that Togo was German colony before being French and independent Of course, and the Togo land at that time of German colonization was actually bigger because it also had like one part of the actual Ghana.

00:15:31: So a big part is culturally really close to Togo especially the Ewe culture on the coasts because its been cut quite lately when French and English took over the German colonies after the first.

00:15:50: Wow, so just to put that in context.

00:15:55: Yes!

00:15:55: That's good.

00:15:56: and your focus if you talk about the architectural heritage is the post-colonial architecture since the sixties or no?

00:16:04: yes but not only.

00:16:06: we also looked at pre-colonal styles or styles that have been developed by non colonial power.

00:16:14: We kind of only excluded from what we were looking at the colonial architecture because it's the one that has been documented.

00:16:23: Because I guess there was a means for this, so there is books about German architecture in Togo and some books on French colonial style but no documentation about what existed before which is vernacular clay architecture in the northern togo, but also the Afro-Brazilian architecture so that it's really specific.

00:16:49: Maybe I can explain a little bit about the architecture that has been built by free slaves returning from Brazil building culture that was learned from Brazilian Portuguese architecture style and they kind of created this mage baroque style with local material and building this clay architecture around courtyards, so that's also a really interesting style.

00:17:19: And it is one of the architecture which was most dangerous because first off all lots of those houses were built in the city centre of Lomé.

00:17:33: now like there are a lot of pressure on the speculation, but also they were built with materials that do not exist anymore in the region because at the time Togo became a place like.

00:17:49: they developed briquetry.

00:17:50: So burn bricks factories and they don't exist any more so it means that their very own material on what those buildings are build does not exists or there is no easy to repair.

00:18:07: So you wrote about it also in German press at the Baunetzwoche.

00:18:13: You put a link and show notes so everybody can read it, plus the Arc Plus magazine.

00:18:20: And for those two articles we actually focused on other part which was main focus of our exhibition which is post-independence architecture The modern architecture.

00:18:33: all of that was part of the exhibition in Venice.

00:18:36: But for those like the article in bow nets and in art plus they are about buildings from Like Bodard is building which he's also really impressive.

00:18:48: Eritage you can find in Lomé because In the in the seventies Lomae wanted to become a bank hub Of West Africa, but this wasn't be the ambition.

00:19:01: never really happened, but a lot of big buildings were built in the in the seventies eighties.

00:19:08: Really interesting quite eccentric as well.

00:19:13: The Venice Pavilion was maybe the biggest curating project, but also through formats such as Out of Fashion on the Triennale Milano or the Recontre Architecturale de l'OMÉ.

00:19:28: You work on exhibitions and spaces for discourse.

00:19:32: more generally asked what role does curating play for you within your architectural practice?

00:19:38: So I guess a huge role at the moment because it kind a bit organically that we started Studio Neda and I guess because of our profiles as well, We kind of ended up doing mainly exhibitions for the first few years.

00:19:56: Yeah!

00:19:56: And you were titled somewhere?

00:19:58: I found it... As the main curators of Togo or The West African Architecture.

00:20:08: So that happens.

00:20:09: That's a bit funny to us, but I guess once the Triennale so you mentioned out of fashion?

00:20:29: That's researching completely different topic around more circularity and fashion.

00:20:36: waste like a lot of wastes produced by the global north is actually sent.

00:20:44: But how did you,

00:20:45: sorry?

00:20:45: We extended our research to waste in general because lots of waste from the Global North are actually send to the Global South to deal with it.

00:20:55: I can't imagine!

00:20:56: You were researching so... From one thing to another.

00:21:00: maybe

00:21:01: Actually, it's because of the obvious theme that if you spend time in Lomé but also in West Africa.

00:21:10: Because this is something happening also in Ghana You will notice those because Lomés has a huge harbour so it receives lots of material from Europe and USA.

00:21:30: be like the biggest trade that Africa has to receive is secondhand from this country.

00:21:37: But actually, it's a good hand in really bad shape as you can imagine and especially for fashion because I could became just a flood of plastic clothes that are not even wearable or suitable.

00:21:58: Do we do with that, no?

00:21:59: And so in Lomé there is a huge... There are actually lots of things done.

00:22:07: A lot creativity happening around this material to repurpose it and reuse it.

00:22:17: For instance We've noticed all the shading above the market Like the market stands in Lomé, but in the whole city they are made out of discarded denims like jeans that are sewn together and repurposed into a shading system kind of umbrellas.

00:22:42: So there's

00:22:43: connection to architecture somehow?

00:22:48: Yes!

00:22:48: Somehow we started looking at how this was shaping the space, the urban city and then thinking as well okay how could we push that further?

00:23:03: because at the end of day there is a lot of materials.

00:23:06: Reducing it into fashion isn't enough.

00:23:10: like You can use maybe one percent of it to repurpose into new clothes, which is done by incredible designers actually in Nome.

00:23:21: But we asked ourselves what could be a design used and architecture used for these materials?

00:23:29: OK so you practice as if everything belongs together.

00:23:35: Let's go your teaching!

00:23:36: I think that's where you are right now.

00:23:43: Yes!

00:23:43: And in Berlin International University, You teached and SOAS at London?

00:23:49: The SOAS is more for research like we're part of a research group linked to the SOAS In Berlin international.

00:23:56: i've been teaching there when i was living in berlin until last year.

00:24:01: At the moment i'm teaching KU Leuven which actually university whole Belgium because they have campuses in Brussels, Ghent and Leuven.

00:24:15: Let's talk about your teaching then.

00:24:16: in Leuvin you engage with architectures that no clearly defined author or building traditions only sparsely documented.

00:24:29: why is it important for students to explore these kinds of architecture?

00:24:35: Yes, so that's the studio I started this semester and i'm really excited about it.

00:24:41: It is super interesting!

00:24:42: I am learning a lot because we have called that Studio.

00:24:46: There Is Not One Architecture And goal is to kind of expand together our architectural history knowledge to complete it with exploring forms of architecture that are in general outside the canon or what is studied.

00:25:08: Speaking of vernacular architecture, sometimes traditional architecture but also informal architecture... I'm not a fan this word but what is Label as informal construction?

00:25:27: and so we're Yeah, trying to study what is the intelligence and knowledge that's included in this type of architecture without architect or by non-architects.

00:25:47: So explain it a really like research lead studio because all students are kind becoming experts one type of architecture that they are choosing and the goal is to, through the semester build a communal database.

00:26:08: Each of them has specialists in wine topics but we bring it together as something common for the whole studio but also ideally as something that will be shareable or an accessible data base.

00:26:26: How do you see the role of architects then when they work in an interdisciplinary group?

00:26:32: Well, that's not a easy question.

00:26:37: The heaviest question at the end!

00:26:41: Like I have to say... ...I don't think the role as architect is something too much predefined for me like the profession of architecture should stay in a kind of flexible position where you know design can take really like different forms and it's always, for me is about the project.

00:27:09: The constellation of that project.

00:27:11: who are you collaborating with?

00:27:14: And then how do become complementar to other projects?

00:27:22: because craft people will bring so much into the design.

00:27:26: You're almost not a designer anymore, but you are more like staging the work of others in another project maybe?

00:27:33: Maybe then take this lead as being the designer or person that draws... For me I really liked this idea that the architect is kind of a figure who can attack several shapes.

00:27:56: That's a good answer for this very difficult question!

00:28:00: Yeah, and also I'm asking because in Germany the tenor is... The role of architects is weakened Because we celebrate the openness inside our let's say professional bubble but from outside maybe people don't understand anymore what an architect is And that is not good for our profession, because somehow we are not taken seriously anymore.

00:28:27: We don't have anything to say and other people make decisions what-to build or whatever.

00:28:34: this why I always ask What's the role of architects?

00:28:38: Absolutely!

00:28:39: But maybe it's also political power.

00:28:45: The architect is really diminishing.

00:28:49: So that's the issue, but there is also this idea and this something I really enjoy working with Fabiola because she comes from another field.

00:28:59: And the fact that architect talks among like... The debate stays into architecture fields and architects talk to architects in two conferences.

00:29:10: it not moving elsewhere no?

00:29:12: Yeah.

00:29:12: so thats a topic we always have in mind with Studio Neda.

00:29:19: make sure that we can also translate to the rest of The world like what?

00:29:26: We're doing at least like building some links or relation.

00:29:30: That's why I'm bringing on okay, the fashion topic into our practice.

00:29:34: so Like.

00:29:36: maybe it would be something else later but like too always kind of linky two other Field and to the daily life as well any way.

00:29:46: It's something I have to do all the time by collaborating because Fabiola, who is not an architect will ask me like explain in a different way what you're talking about or tell me non-architectural language.

00:30:02: Because that doesn't mean anything to me sometimes as architects describing buildings or describing space.

00:30:11: so it's quite challenging more accessible or With.

00:30:19: yeah, we've keeping the complexity of it and that's something that I enjoy a lot.

00:30:25: also

00:30:27: Yeah And as I heard you give that to your students That information about what an architect is at.

00:30:35: What he's not?

00:30:36: Yeah in thinking of your profession not as an isolated profession, but as something part of a negative society and an active cultural scene.

00:30:47: Yeah I'm very thankful for your time.

00:30:49: i know you have a busy week.

00:30:51: thank you very much for the interview Jean Autran Edor!

00:30:55: Thank

00:30:55: you so much.

00:30:56: that was studying to build The Bonnets Campus Alumni Podcast presented by Gira.

00:31:01: we hope you'll tune in again next time.

00:31:06: Editing

00:31:06: and Publication Katharina Lux-Baunetz Campus, Presentation & Audio Production Mi Kerstin Kunekat Berlin.