Autor: Nicholas Boyarsky

Nicholas Boyarsky kao bivši student i saradnik Zahe Hadid je za AABH, a zahvaljujući angažmanu naše aktivne članice Senade Demirović, napisao osvrt na lično iskustvo i profesionalni uticaj jedne od najuticajnijih i najuspješnijih arhitektica u savremenoj arhitekturi:

Na nedavno održanom simpoziju na univerzitetu Princeton u čast Zahe Hadid nazvanom „Pedagogija kao praksa“, pisac i historičar Mark Wigley govorio je o banalnosti većine savremenih tekstova o Zahi Hadid kao nekritičke biografije hvalospjeva. Za njega, najveća snaga iza Zahinog rada bila je u njenoj ulozi provokatorice ustanovljenih pravila i vizije arhitektonskog establišmenta, ili kako ga on naziva – „Antitjelesna arhitektura“. Ovakva nekonzistentnost u Wigley-ovom razmišljanju (on je 1988. godine, zajedno sa Philip Johnson-om bio direktor izložbe ‘Arhitektura dekonstruktivizma’ u Muzeju moderne umjetnosti u New York-u, koja je za cilj imala da ustanovi rad Hadid, Tschumi-a, Lebeskind-a, Koolhaas-a, Gehry-a, Eisenman-a i ostalih kao novi mainstream u arhitekturi) otkriva izrazitu kompleksnost u shvatanju Zahine višestruke uloge kao profesorice i vizionarke, ali i osnivačice kompanije koja je postala eponim za komercijalni dizajn, sa svim korporativnim i političkim preprekama koje to nosi.

Zaha Hadid se svakako kritički protivila sistemu i prevazišla mnoge prepreke da bi trijumfirala kao jedna od najznačajnijih savremenih arhitektica. Za ženu arhitekticu, ali i ženu muslimanku porijeklom iz Iraka u Londonu, ostvariti tako mnogo u dominantno muškoj, bjelačkoj Anglo-saksonsko protestantskoj sredini i profesiji, svjedoči o izrazitoj snazi volje i odlučnosti. Na ličnom nivou, Zaha je znala biti izrazito stroga i bezkompromisna, ali u isto vrijeme lojalna i velikodušna prijateljica za sve nas. Iako dolazi iz imućne i privilegovane porodice, u korijenu njenog uspjeha stoje jedinstven i neuhvatljiv talenat kao dizajnerice nevjerovatne inventivnosti i elegancije. Ova briljantnost  podcrtana je njenom sposobnošću da je poveže sa uticajem i idejama ruskih arhitekata konstruktivizma – Leonidov-a, Melnikov-a i Ginsburg-a, radom velikog umjetnika suprematizma – Kasimir Malevich-a, svojom ljubavi za rad Oscar-a Niemayer-a, te je dodatno pospješena radom sa profesorima i osnivačima OMA-e: Rem Koolhaas-om i Elias Zenghelis-om. Kenneth Frampton 1983. godine piše o dodatnoj dimenziji u njenom radu koji prepoznaje kao uticaj arapskog porijekla povezanog sa idejom o progresu: „Iako ethos njenog rada proizilazi iz suprematizma, važno je prepoznati i element inskripcije – neke vrste kufske kaligrafije zasnovane na transnacionalnim elementima, inskripcije koja je hermetična i transformisana, a ipak očigledna.“ Frampton tako u projektima Zahe Hadid prepoznaje odgovor na jedno od najtežih pitanja arhitekture 20og stoljeća – kako stvarati modernu kulturu bez reaktivnih parodija na historiju, ali i svođenja na linarni funkcionalizam optimizovane tehnike.

Zahina intuitivna i bezgranična kreativnost se oslanjala i na vrlo jasno razumjevanje značaja i uticaja njenih kolega i kolegica i mentora koji su joj davali snagu da osvaja svijet. Provoditi vrijeme s njom kao student, kolega i prijatelj bilo je koliko o radu, toliko i o razmjeni tračeva i anegdota o zajedničkim prijateljima i poznanicima, stvaranju i povezivanju velike mreže prijatelja, porodice i saradnika kroz neprekidnu razmjenu SMS poruka. Zahu je formiralo njeno obrazovanje na AA pod mentorstvom Alvin-a Boyarsky-og kojeg je uvijek navodila kao veliki uticaj i podršku ličnom i profesionalnom razvoju. Zajedno sa Nigel Coates-om, Peter Wilson-om i Peter Salter-om, te profesorima kao što su Bernard Tschumi, Peter Cook i mnogi drugi, težila je da da novu energiju i intelektualni razvoj arhitektonskom diskursu, kritiku i opoziciju besmislenom formalizmu post-modernizma kroz ponovnu analizu principa eksperimentalne faze ranog modernizma. Ovaj rad na AA vodio je razvoju njene prakse sa odabranim studentima kao što su Michael Wolfson, Brian Ma Siy i Alistair Standing koji su joj se pridružili u stvaranju prvih projekata – konkurs za rezidenciju irskog premijera 1979-80, pobjedničkog rada za projekat Peak u Hong Kong-u 1983, te prijedloga za objekte na Traflgar trgu u Londonu 1985. godine.

Ovako stvoreni prijateljski i profesionalni odnosi održavali su njenu praksu u prvim teškim godinama dok nije počela da gradi velike projekte i stvori internacionalnu reputaciju. Stvorili su osnovu i scenu za sav razvoj koji je došao poslije, gdje je doprinos Patrik Schumacher-a kroz parametrički dizajn i optimizaciju odigrao veliku ulogu, područjima u dizajnu kojima se nikada nije lično prilagodila do kraja nastavljajući praviti prvo skice i crteže rukom. Ostalo je historija, serija nevjerovatnih i jedinstvenih objekata kao što su Vitra vatrogasna stanica, Phaeno naučni centar u Wolfsburg-u, Heyday Aliyev kulturni centar u Baku-u, Maxxi muzej u Rimu, kuća Port u Antwerp-u i mnogi drugi, od kojih su neki još uvijek u izgradnji.
Profesorska pozicija je bila vrlo značajan dio karijere Zahe Hadid, te je predavala skoro u kontinuitetu prvo na AA u Londonu, a zatim na Columbia univerzitetu u New York-u, Akademiji primjenjenih umjetnosti u Beču i Yale univerzitetu. Uživala u svom učešću u prvobitnom razvijanju ideje, prisustvu prostoru bezgraničnog eksperimentisanja, propitivanja i latentnog razmišljanja studenata bez pritiska prakse. Na svakom predavanju započinjala je svoju priču ispočetka, govoreći prvo o ličnostima, a onda i preokretima, otkrićima i preprekama na putovanju od AA do danas. Dodjela RIBA zlatne medalje prošle godine, malo prije njene smrti, je bila samo još jedna pokaznica velikog značaja njenog rada koja me je navela da spekulišem o mogućnosti njene ponovne inovacije u arhitektonskom razmišljanju, gdje će početi od sredine ka krajevima, preokrenuti sve i još jednom iritirati ustaljeno razmišljanje postavljajući nove pravce u arhitekturi. Nažalost, ovome nećemo nikada svjedočiti.  

O autoru:
Nicholas Boyarsky je arhitekta i profesor. Osnivač je londonske arhitektonske prakse Boyarsky Murphy Architects. Studirao je arhitekturu na AA School u Lodonu, te na četvrtoj i petoj godini studija radio pod mentorstvom Zahe Hadid u sklopu Dimploma Unit 9. Radio je za Zahu Hadid od 1988 do 1989 godine na projektima u Berlinu i Hamburgu.

Zaha Hadid

Working with Zaha Hadid

Nicholas Boyarsky as a former student and colleague of Zaha Hadid has, thanks to the effort of our active member Senada Demirovic, given his personal reflection on this experience and professional influence of her work for AABH:

At a recent symposium at Princeton celebrating Zaha Hadid entitled ‘Pedagogy as Practice’ the writer and historian Mark Wigley spoke of the banality of most writings about Zaha Hadid that fall into the trope of adulatory biography. For Wigley Zaha’s greatest strength was her role as an irritant to the conventions and preconceptions of the architectural establishment, something he terms ‘Antibody Architecture’. This apparent inconsistency in Wigley’s position (Wigley had, alongside Philip Johnson, directed the 1988 Deconstructivist Architecture exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York which sought to legitimise the work of Hadid, Tschumi, Libeskind, Koolhaas, Gehry, Eisenman and others as the next style for mainstream architecture) reveals some of the complexities in understanding Zaha’s dual roles as teacher and architectural visionary, and as founder of the commercially successful eponymous global design company with all the corporate and political constraints that leading such an enterprise entails.

Certainly Zaha was an irritant and she overcame many obstacles to emerge triumphant as one of the most significant contemporary architects of our times. For a woman architect and furthermore an Iraqi-born Muslim woman living in London to achieve so much in such a male dominated White Anglo Saxon Protestant (WASP) culture bears witness to an incredible strength of will and determination. Personally Zaha could be extremely abrasive and uncompromising and at the same time she was also an extremely loyal and generous friend to so many of us. Whilst Hadid came from a wealthy and privileged background at the root of her success lay her hard won, unique, and restless talent as a designer of extraordinary invention and elegance. Underlying this brilliance was a deft weaving together of disparate elements such as her fascination with the Russian Constructivist architects such as Leonidov, Melnikov and Ginsburg, the Suprematist artist Kasimir Malevich, and also her love for the work of Oscar Niemeyer all of which was underpinned by the influences of her teachers, the founders of OMA, Rem Koolhaas and Elias Zenghelis. To this emerging fusion Kenneth Frampton detected in 1983 a further Arab element that was married to the idea of progress: ‘Thus although the ethos of her work derives from Suprematism, it is important to note that it also tends towards inscription; towards a kind of kufic calligraphy compounded out of transnational elements’ an inscription that was hermetic yet revealed, for Frampton, the conundrum of the late 20th century: ‘how to continue with modern culture without resorting to reactionary parodies of history or being reduced to the linear functionalism of optimised technique’.

Zaha’s intuitive and almost boundless creativity was reinforced by an acute social understanding and recognition of the influences and importance of her peers, friends and mentors which gave her the confidence to take on the world. To spend time with her as a student, colleague and friend was about gossip and amusing tales and memories of mutual friends and colleagues – one was witnessing the weaving of a vast and disparate network of friends, family, and like-minded collaborators that was later all orchestrated by incessant text messaging. Zaha was formed by her education at the Architectural Association under the direction of Alvin Boyarsky who she would always credit as a major influence and support in her development. Alongside fellow students such as Nigel Coates, Peter Wilson and Peter Salter and their tutors Bernard Tschumi, Rem Koolhaas, Peter Cook, and many others she sought to reinvigorate and reinvent fresh architectural discourses in opposition to the stultifying formalism of post-modernism, in her case through revisiting the tenets of the experimental phases of early modernism. These shared experiences at the AA led to the development of her practice as selected students such as Michael Wolfson, Brian Ma Siy, Kar Hwa Ho and Alistair Standing joined her to produce the key early projects such as her competition scheme for the residence of the Irish Prime Minister of 1979-80, her winning entry for the Peak in Hong Kong of 1983 and the proposal for the Grand Buildings in Trafalgar Square of 1985.

These relationships sustained Zaha through the difficult early years of practice until she began to build. They set the scene for the subsequent growth of her office and the contributions of Patrik Schumacher in the realms of parametricism and optimisation, areas that she never really felt comfortable in as she continued to sketch and test out ideas by hand. The rest is history marked by a series of incredible and unique buildings such as the Vitra Fire Station, the Phaeno Science Centre in Wolfsburg, the Heyday Aliyev cultural centre in Baku, the Maxxi Museum in Rome, the Port House, Antwerp, and many others, some of which are still being completed.

Teaching was a significant part of Zaha’s career and she taught almost continuously first, at the AA in London and then at Columbia University, at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, and at Yale. She enjoyed the beginnings of ideas, the sense of open-ended experimentation and the latent possibilities that students could bring to the table without constraints of practice. She would always, in every lecture, tell her story from its very beginnings, dwelling on the personalities and then charting the breakthroughs, discoveries and setbacks from the early AA days to the present. Her RIBA Gold Medal given last year shortly before she died was a case in point and, given her fragility, it was a remarkable tour de force that did however lead me to speculate on how she might one day mix the story up, start from the middle and work sideways, flip it over and surprise and irritate us with yet more new directions for architecture to follow her to. Sadly we will never know.

About the author:
Nicholas Boyarsky is an architect and teacher. He is a director of London-based Boyarsky Murphy Architects. Nicholas studied architecture at the AA School in London where he studied in Zaha Hadid’s Diploma Unit 9 for his fourth and fifth year projects. He worked for Zaha in 1988-89 on projects for Berlin and Hamburg.

Datum objavljivanja: 22.05.2017.