INTERVIEW WITH KJETIL THORSEN, SNOHETTA
My first question is a very general consideration regard- ing the Scandinavian architecture. What is your opinion about this argument? Can we talk about an issue called Scandinavian architecture or not? Yes, we can, to some extent. It is a matter of how you interpret it and what are you looking to? Of course, there is a strong European tradition. There is an American and especially North American maybe interaction to what we do in Europe and vice versa. However, the material we use and direct relationship to the landscape is still something that characterizes the Norwe- gian and Swedish architecture, historical and still today.
What about your way of doing? Do you think you belong to this Scandinavian architecture or you consider your- selves as part of the international movement? Again, in the same manner. Yes a little bit and no. We do be- long to some part of that tradition that it is focused on the way of using the materials and can get the core and the essence out of the content of the project, by simplification maybe. At the same time, we are in a way influenced by other architec- tures around and outside Norway.
Do you want to explain more about these influences? The influence is more related to the way of thinking and breaking the barriers of the traditional and classical architec- ture. I think there is no contradiction between being local and international. It is a state of mind and not related to how you are collocated in the international scene or locally.
In your discourses, you often refer to the Transpositional design. Could you explain this concept for us? This is not putting many professionals to work together in a professional manner, but asking the people to change their professions. We have many professionals in our organization: graphical designer, interior designers, landscape architects, urban planners, architects and artists. In our methodology the engineers may become architect, architects may become landscape architects and the landscape architect becomes the philosopher, the philosopher becomes the artist and so on.
What is the effect of such approach on your design? What happens is that the different professions do not feel the responsibility of the borrowed professions and they do not have a negative experience. In fact we open ourselves to new doors. What we are achieving by that is a more open discus- sion in the creative passage of our work. Then we come back to our profession, of course, and this regards the production and organization of the project. In the creative work this helps us to have the combination of new ideas.
Do you have any specific approach to the materials of construction? We don’t have any preferred material. Any material is great, depending on how you use it. Any material has, if you want, its
كامران افشار نادرىKamran Afshar Naderi
Norwegian wild reindeer pavilion, © Diephotodesigner.de OHG 2010
© Swarovski Kristallwelten / David Schreyer
Kindergarten, Norway, Snøhetta
ZEB Pilot house, Norway, Paal-André Schwital
embedded soul that can be eventually used properly.
We see you use sometimes artisanship and sometimes the digital technology. How do you combine these two? I think the architecture is in the span between the analog and digital world. It is not the matter of only analog or only digital. It is always a mix. For example you can design a project in computer and then with aid of digital machine and CNC you cut the material to reach exactly you computer rendering ef- fect. For example, when you cut the wood with the machines, then you need to put the pieces in the right sequence together and fix them. This is a craftsmen way of working. We use the same combination in using stones and masonry for doing architecture or landscape.
Now let me ask you a completely different question. What is your approach towards the clients? Well, we try always to involve the clients in our transposition- ing process. We try to be interactive as we can. We don’t believe in architecture happening just with the actions. As far as they are part of this transpositioning process, the client may become the architect. Who knows! May be put him in a position in which he will be demanded to develop a concept.
I would like to ask you about your new projects. The ones you find them more challenging or important. At the moment we have about 17 projects under construc- tion, and we have about 60 projects on the drawing board. The most important projects are those few we could utilize architecture as a tool for developing society. One for example is the social sustainability and cultural sustainability for Saudi Arabia in The King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture. Where we were able to open up the first public cinema in Saudi Ara- bia and there can enter both men and women from the same entrance and mixing up in the main library. So the building is a sort of emancipation element. At the same time we have the one we that are pushing forwards a local community to become an important generator for the new urban develop- ment of the city. This is happening in Bergen with The new National Academy of the Arts. The same with the expansion of San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Here a community is expanding and is understanding how the arts work within the society.
Busan Opera House, South Korea, © Snøhetta and Tegmarkساختمان اپراي بوسان، كره جنوبي، اسنوهتا و تگ مارك
Alexandria Library, Egypt, © Gerald Zugmann
Volkan Beehive, Oslo, © Morten Brakestad