1997.03; CWE summeruniversities

Workshopping: Coast Wise Europe Summer University 1996
verschenen/published in: Christiaan Weiler (ed.). Coast Wise Europe. Architecture - Coast - Tourism. Rotterdam, Academie van Bouwkunst/Academy of Architecture, 1997.

Since the summer of 1996, I served in the staff of 'Coast Wise Europe', an international project for students of architecture. Organized by the Rotterdam Academy of Architecture, 22 schools of architecture from as many countries in Europe participated. Main theme of the project was the impact of (mass) tourism on the coasts of Europe (the Atlantic coasts, the Baltic coasts and the Mediterranean coasts), and the role - both negative and critically-positive - of architecture and architects in this process.

Phase one of the project comprised research studies by students of each partipating school of a 100 kilometer stretch of their own country's coastline, plus critical design-projects based on the data found.

Phase two brought students from all these countries together in international workshops ('summer universities'): in the summer of 1996 there were workshops in Efes/Selçuk (Turkyie), Prora/Rügen (BRD) and Maasvlakte/Rotterdam (the Netherlands), in the summer of 1997 there was an additional workshop on board three 'tall ships' sailing the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Finland, and in the summer of 1998 even two more workshops in Izola (Sloveneija)/Rovign (Croatia) and in Porto (Portugal).

Phase three aimed at 'broadcasting' these findings to a wider audience. Three media were exploited: the publication 'Europe: Coast Wise. An Anthology of reflections on architecture and tourism' (1997), presentations at the Expo'98 in Lisboa (Portugal) and a travelling exhibition - a 40 foot sea-container filled with information on the findings of the national projects and the various 'summer universities', crisscrossing Europe visiting the participating schools, with the publication Coast Wise Europe. Architecture - Coast - Tourism serving as a catalogue. The present text was written for this catalogue.

Joint motors behind the CWE-projects were architect and critic Jan de Graaf, and Bert van Meggelen - then the mesmerizing director of the Rotterdam Academy of Architecture.

As an integral part of the Coast Wise Europe-project, three international summer universities were organised in Efes/Selçuk (Turkyie), Prora/Rügen (BRD) and Maasvlakte/Rotterdam (the Netherlands) in the summer of 1996. They were conceived as sequals to the more nationally orientated projects of the individual schools: participation in these 'summer universities', or 'workshops' as they were referred to, was open to students that had already studied the main CWE-themes, i.e. 'coast' / 'tourism' / 'Europe' in their home countries. It was the goal of the summer universities to exchange the insights gathered at home.

Main theme of the Efes-workshop was the problem of mass-tourism flooding an important archeological site of classical Hellenistic civilisation and the rustic Turkish town of Selçuk that lies next to it. In Prora the future of a 4.5 km complex, designed by NAZI-Germany to house 20.000 tourists, and subsequently used to house the Soviet army and the GDR 'Volksarmee' was at stake: retain and restore it, or destroy it? The Maasvlakte-workshop challenged students to search for potential touristical qualities of large scale, man made industrial infrastructures, some yet-to-be-constructed in the Northsea.
[Since this text was written in 1997, it does not discuss the CWE-workshops organized in 1997 and 1998.]

Apart from the main CWE themes, each of these workshops focussed on ‘dealing with the past’: a typical European issue. In Prora, the past is still very much present in all its harshness and paradoxes; for some people these issues are still too hot to handle. In Efes, the atrocities of the past are all but forgotten: the past has become something ‘interesting’, and/or ‘beautifull’ and/or ‘romantic’ and/or just ‘nice pastime’ - these ‘pasts’ collide massively with present needs. On Maasvlakte, there is as yet hardly any ‘past’; here only the ‘present’ may be considered as the ‘past’ of a future ‘future’. Although this triptych of history could only be perceived by those odd-and-a-few students and tutors that participated in more than one summer university, still these issues of ‘time’ made themselves felt in each and every architectural project that was contemplated upon during these hot summer weeks of 1996.
Apart from their contents, the summer universities were also explicitely set up as experiments in architectural education. Where workshops are no new phenomenon, not even in education, what's so special about them compared to 'normal' educational practice? First of all their short time-span: in the case of the CWE summer universities 8 to 10 days only. There is no time to lose: you've gotta get to work from the minute you arrive at what is in the most literal sense a 'work'-shop. Scientific research through books is too time-consuming; projects are more likely to be worked upon on an abstract, conceptual level than elaborated into all-too-earthly humdrum; therefor technically detailed drawings give way to visionary sketches.
Workshops offer great opportunities to work with new, and therefore potentially exciting tutors, likely to be experts in their field. Likewise, you meet other new people, that may have different ideas, methods and approaches vis à vis the issues at stake.
What then was so very special about the CWE summer universities? I would say they distinguished themselves by being 'international', 'in situ' and 'fun'.
International participation results in a Babylonian atmosphere, with all the pro's and con's that come with it. It's sometimes hard to discuss topics as complicated and personal as architectural proposals often are, in a language other than your mother's tongue; on the other hand, just that forces you to be really explicit and articulated in all opinions you express. Unlike normal individual student-exchange programs, students are not experiencing this 'strangeness' isolatedly all by themselves; as everybody is 'in the same ship' nobody needs to feel awkward - in stead a great solidarity made itself felt during all three workshops. That permitted all workshop-studio's to critically and fruitfully evaluate and assess the various nationally-based approaches to architectural design that predictably manifested their existence. Thus, the summer universities came close to what my Latin dictionary states under 'universitas': 'the whole', and more specifically 'the world-as-a-whole' (cfr 'universe'), and even 'perfection' (in texts by early Christian authors).]
Secondly, all three summer universities took place 'in situ' - right on the spot. This proved to be much more than just an 'à la mode' promotional element. Being 'there' in the first place means travelling away from 'home-base'- that goes for students and tutors alike. This results not just in a vacation-like feeling, but also serves to free the mind from habitual thinking patterns: you're more open to new experiences (cfr international exchange). Besides, it's always fun and exciting to go abroad; the excitement adds adrenaline and zest to research-and-design efforts. Far more important, being 'there' proves very useful, too. Excursions and field trips provide a direct and instant 'feel of the place'; the 'genius loci' that is so often, and rightly so, the topic of many an abstract post-Modernist debate, becomes tangible. Designing on the very spot also guarantees instantaneous response from the people involved, even where final workshop results tend to be a bit abstract - which to some participants is not wholly satisfying. The proposals coming out the various Efes studios were presented in the open air of a Selçuk street, with the mayor and other local people criticising, and local and national media present. The unorthodox CWE-visions on Prora were directly injected into the petrified debate in Germany on the complex' future by means of a live program on national TV, produced on one of the terraces of the building itself. It gives participants the feeling to witness exciting contemporary developments taking place 'in real time' - e.g. the unfolding of a Baltic perspective for Prora. In Rotterdam, students could enjoy the spectacle of giant container-ships sailing past at less then 100 metres from the tents they worked and slept in.
That brings me to my third point: the CWE-workshops were not only about 'working' - and quite concentratedly at that; they also offered a 24-hours-a-day experiment in 'living': eating, swimming, sleeping, having fun. Personal experiences vitalise professional exchange: can Croats really sing louder than Fins, how much do the Dutch drink and smoke, is it true what they say about Scots, are Polish girls really that beautiful, are all Lets and Lithuanians as aristocratic as the ones we met, is raki really much like ouzo, are Baltic waters better to swim in than Aegean waves, etc. However vague, the concept of what might be 'Europe' becomes somehow tangible: a continent of many cultures, closely packed with peoples, their cultures and their pasts.

The most wonderful effect of the CWE workshops? Many participants (many students, but also an occasional tutor) discovered unthought-of qualities in themselves. Sometimes negative ones (shortcomings, limitations - but then: discovering where your limitations are might prove a valuable insight); often very positive ones: many students, but also an odd tutor and observer, have felt a glimpse of what 'being an architect' might be, they may have perceived something of the enchanting potential that 'architecture' as a discipline might have. Architecture need not be dead as long as it succeeds in producing enticing, unheard-of visions of futures-to-be for all our past and present problems.

Grafisch ontwerp/Graphic Design: Design_onderweg (Martijn Bertam & Caroline Couwenbergh), Rotterdam
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