Galerie Jaroslava Fragnera and the Academy of Art, Architecture and Design will present the third edition of the Biennial of Experimental Architecture during September and October. The biennial is the only platform dedicated to experimental architecture and will again showcase interesting figures on a global scale. It will feature exhibitions by Zaha Hadid Architects and other academic schools, a site-specific pavilion, a meetup for academic institutions, workshops, and intriguing film screenings. The highlight of the biennial will be an international symposium with notable speakers such as Patrik Schumacher (Zaha Hadid Architects), Ben van Berkel (UNStudio), and Wolf D. Prix (Coop Himmelb(l)au).
 
The first edition in 2013 was dedicated to academic studios in Vienna (for the prestigious dieAngewandte) and Innsbruck (Institute for Experimental Architecture), in the Czech Republic (UMPRUM, FA ČVUT), and in Slovakia (VŠVU). The second edition, subtitled New Manifesto, introduced significant and influential architects and educators from the middle generation (USA, Europe, Australia) with various approaches and specializations within the field. This year's third edition will familiarize attendees with both academic institutions and will present previously unpublished projects by Zaha Hadid Architects from competitions that were never realized. A new feature of this year's edition will be a site-specific experimental pavilion in Malostranské náměstí, designed by students under the guidance of Kristina Schinegger and Stefan Rutzinger (SOMA atelier, Vienna) at the university in Innsbruck.
 
EAB Program #3
 
Academic Platforms of Computational Design
UM Gallery
September 6 – October 7, 2017 | 10:00–17:00
The exhibition Academic Platforms of Computational Design (at the UM Gallery at the Academy of Art, Architecture and Design in Prague) will open first, featuring UMPRUM Prague and a number of prestigious foreign schools such as CITA Copenhagen, ICD/ITKE Stuttgart, UCL Bartlett London, IAAC Barcelona, ETH Zurich, Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia, TU Wien, or MOLAB ČVUT Prague. Academic platforms are not only places for imparting the necessary knowledge and know-how for the profession, but also unique environments for research and innovation. New design and production technologies require a greater role for experimentation, testing, prototyping, and development. Within Western European (among others) educational institutions, platforms focused on researching the possibilities of computational design and new technologies are emerging in collaboration with related fields, characterized by close cooperation with other scientific disciplines and technological research. The exhibition presents the potential for research in the field of computational architectural design on academic platforms through models, prototypes, and video projections. In this context, works from selected Central European academic platforms focused on computational design in architecture (studio AIII UMPRUM, MOLAB) are also presented.
 
Meetup Prague
UMPRUM
September 6 | 10:00–17:00
The opening of the exhibition on September 6 at 6 PM will be preceded by the Meetup Prague conference with guests from the represented schools: Phil Ayres, Giulio Brugnaro, Jan Petrš, Jindřich Ráftl, Shota Tsikoliya, Imro Vaško, David Kovařík, Tomáš Tholt, Mateusz Zwierzycki, Erik Martinez, Martin Alvarez, Christopher Müller, and Stefan Parascho.

EAB Symposium
Cinema Světozor
October 26, 2017 | 8:00–19:30
An integral part of EAB is the international symposium on experimental architecture. This year, a very strong lineup of experts from the USA and Europe will speak again: principal of Zaha Hadid Architects Patrik Schumacher, his colleagues Jakub Klaška and Shajay Bhooshan (co-founders of CODE, ZHA atelier focusing on research in computational design), Ben van Berkel (co-founder of UNStudio, NL), Filippo Gilardi (MX3D, NL), Preston Scott Cohen (Harvard University, NY, USA), David Ruy (SCI-Arc, LA, USA), Moritz Dörstelmann (ICD/ITKE Universität Stuttgart, DE), Michael Hansmeyer (DE), Wolf D. Prix (co-founder of Coop Himmelb(l)au, AT), and Kristina Schinegger (co-founder of SOMA, AT).
Tickets will be available for purchase online in advance or at the box office of Cinema Světozor.
 
Experimental Site-Specific Pavilion
Malostranské náměstí
October 16 – 30, 2017
Austrian architects Kristina Schinegger and Stefan Rutzinger (SOMA), who have extensive experience with the realization of experimental architecture, along with their students from the university in Innsbruck, will construct an experimental site-specific pavilion made of cellulose in Malostranské náměstí in the second half of October. The modified cellulose, which the architecture students intensely researched in the previous semester specifically for the realization within EAB #3, will demonstrate to visitors the material's characteristics in various parts of the construction.
The pavilion, designed specifically for Malostranské náměstí, will also transform into a summer mini-cinema for three evenings, for which the director and curator of the National Film Archive, Johana Švarcová, has prepared three blocks of short student films from the FAMU camera department. This thematic screening dedicated to architecture and space is composed of first-year exercises titled Familiarization. In this exercise, students from the camera department have had the same task for several years – to shoot a short video in front of the National Theatre and visually confront modern architecture with historical architecture into a consistent film form.
(Screening dates: Monday, October 16, and Tuesday, October 17, and 24, every evening from 7 PM)
 
Following last year's edition, workshops will also be held this year:
GROTTO 4.0 – Jindřich Ráftl, Jan Tůma
(Studio R/FRM, September 14–15)
HACKING PAPER – Martin Gsandtner, Ondřej Pokoj
(EAB, October 6–8)
META MATTER – Jakub Klaška, Igor Pantić
(ZHA, October 23–25). 
The workshops will focus on experiencing and mastering strategies of digital design, material testing, and verifying research on the realization of spatial concepts. Participants will also have the opportunity to directly confront professionals and become part of the EAB exhibition. The workshop is primarily aimed at students of architecture, design, fashion, and art but is also open to a broader professional audience.

The Biennial of Experimental Architecture is the first platform in the Czech Republic mapping and introducing this form of architecture, established by the Architectura association in 2013. It facilitates meetings with internationally recognized experts and studios. It consists of an exhibition and a symposium. EAB will again include a student workshop, a new site-specific pavilion in Malostranské náměstí with a thematic screening (in collaboration with NFA and FAMU), and a Czech-English publication summarizing the previous three editions.

Experimental architecture is an alternative to mainstream construction production, utilizing contemporary tools of parametric design, robotic systems, and synthetic biology. It is directly connected to the development of technologies and materials. Proposals for experimental architecture are characterized by their multiformity, plasticity, and natural tectonics. In the Czech environment, experimental architecture has long been dealt with by educators Miloš Florián at FA ČVUT in Prague, Imrich Vaško at VŠUP in Prague (studio AIII since 2011), and Martin Gsandtner (VŠUP, Archip, FA ČVUT).

www.eabiennial.cz