In the Wake of the Last Survivors

Holocaust Memorial Sites Text: László Levente Balogh As long as the summer of 2015, there had been no monument of whatsoever in Debrecen to commemorate the local victims of the Holocaust. The city made a decision to make up for this on the 70th anniversary of the Shoah. However, the memorial wall erected here popped […]

Walls of Commemoration

Comparing the Memorial Wall of the Budapest Ghetto and the Holocaust Memorial Site of Debrecen Text: Gerda Széplaky The wall is one of the leitmotifs of memorial architecture which evidently hosts a variety of forms expressing commemoration verbally and visually. Wall monuments tend to be sculpture-like objects standing in the middle of a vacant square […]

Destiny of a Housing Estate 5

Careful Orientations in the 21st Century Purvciems Housing Estate, Riga, Latvia, 1965–78 Text and photos: Melinda Benkő The process of privatization in Latvia after the change of the political system resulted in returning agricultural lands formerly cultivated to the descendants of their pre-war owners. This in turn brought about a two-level system of ownership on […]

Ottoman Tastes – Creative Energies

Urban Rehabilitation Scheme in Istanbul Text and photos: Eszter Baku Istanbul city has shown some genuinely large-scale development tendencies in the past few decades. Year by year there are more and more districts and zones being revived here. Following the facelift project of Kuzguncuk, a versatile quarter of the Anatolian part of the city, now […]

In Lack of the Stone of Wisdom

Urban Opinion Gurus Text: Zsolt Korren Although in our everday life we are perfectly able to recognize and identify the people who have the charisma to influence our decisions, choices and preferences in various areas of reality by sharing their expertise, knowledge or opinions, it is primarily the economic and social studies that make in-depth […]

Albert Schickedanz (1846–1915)

Gábor Zoboki’s Memorial Speech at Fiumei Cemetery The oeuvre of architect Albert Schickedanz coincides with one of the most flourishing eras of Budapest. Following the integration of the city in 1873 and the foundation of the Municipal Public Works Committee in 1870 magical energies worked miracles in this city for a few decades thanks to […]

Reporting the Front

The Program of Alejandro Avarena curator for the Venice Biennale 2016 The Venice Biennale has announced the theme selected by 2016 Biennale director Alejandro Avarena. Titled Reporting From the Front, next year’s Biennale will be an investigation into the role of architects in the battle to improve the living conditions for people all over the […]