If Helmut Schmidt, the gods have blessed him, had been a Bavarian, one could at least blame him. Anyone who has visions should go to the doctor, “he said. Well, we are at the doctor’s, with the PCR test, etc. in these times. But the visions are in a bad way. Especially when you think of the cultural buildings in the Free State and the visions that stand for them in the room. The old, once proud buildings are rotten to themselves. The new ones are not even built.
The Neue Pinakothek, for example, whose roof is raining through, was closed three years ago and renovation has not yet started. In the Haus der Kunst it will not be called “Renovate / Innovate” for the next few years either, even if the architect David Chipperfield has been working on it since 2013 on behalf of the state government. Nuremberg has called off its concert hall construction, in the state capital the fight is still going on for a concert hall for Bavaria, which should be the first to be entirely dedicated to the digital age and music education. But this too – a vision that is threatened to be torpedoed and sunk again and again.
But it does exist, the longing for design. The architect Peter Haimerl stands for the longing and even more for the actual design. Haimerl built the much-celebrated concert hall in Blaibach, he devised a cultural use for the old power plant in Aubing, which will now be different, but still come. And he launched an idea for the renovation of the Gasteig that dreamed of a major change in use: to fit a huge, open library into the Philharmonie and, in return, to build a new, better-sounding Philharmonic in the old location of the City Library. His chess-like motto: “Castling can also be profit.”
The Bavarian Culture Prize winner proclaimed it this week: “Architecture has to be brave and crazy, otherwise it is meaningless!” This is especially true for cultural buildings. The opera, of all things, offered him a forum for this Exclamtio. Because the Bavarian State Opera, which under Nikolaus Bachler himself registered a minimum renovation requirement of 160 million euros, has launched a digital series of lectures and debates together with the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, the Komische Oper Berlin, the Zurich Opera House and the Stuttgart State Theaters: the “Cultural Buildings of the Future Initiative”. In the context of this, something else should finally be talked about other than the perpetual drama of the high costs of cultural buildings, and that because the same everywhere: across national borders.
The new Bavarian State Director Serge Dorny, who supports the project, does not just want to talk superficially about the “opportunities” for integration that arise from cultural sites and that are often invoked: “Opera houses and cultural institutions have to keep asking themselves how they can help shape and change urban societies, which interactions and dynamics are conceivable here, “he says and calls for more concrete self-analysis.
Christos Chantzaras and Stefan Höglmaier discussed together with Peter Haimerl, who has also held a professorship at the University of Art and Industrial Design in Linz since the 2019/20 winter semester. Chantzaras, who is a business economist and architect at the Technical University of Munich, launched the “Make Munich Weird” initiative together with professors a few years ago. Their conviction, which is based on scientific data: only a city that leaves space open for the improvised, the unexpected and weird, will continue to develop and attract creative spirits, who will ultimately ensure the prosperity of this city. Stefan Höglmaier founded his own company for real estate development at the age of 24 and has implemented such spectacular projects in Munich as the conversion of the Schwabing bunker from the Nazi era into apartments and an art gallery that mainly deals with architectural topics.
Haimerl and his colleagues distilled essential problems that crop up again and again in cultural buildings in and outside Bavaria. On the one hand, there are the “rigid public competition procedures”, as Haimerl criticizes. With their narrowly worded assignments, they were not enough to create sustainable, participatory, creative and courageous places. And particularly perfidious: It is precisely these competitions that shift the actual urban and regional development onto the creative ideas of individual architects. And their courage, if he is there.
It takes a joint development of visions from politics and thought leaders
It would be much more important that politicians develop visions together with committed thought leaders. These could then serve as the basis for participatory processes with the broader public. Often that is exactly what is missing. There is a vacancy – for example a large building site, which would then be provided with no view of the larger urban context with residential development according to the principle of functional and cheap. A vision for the area to be built on, but also for a single building to be renovated, is often completely lacking. That takes revenge especially when important cultural buildings are about to be transformed into a new age.
But not only the state, but also private companies in a region or city should become more aware of their role as designers. Christos Chantzaras and Stefan Höglmaier made particular reference to this. “Even if this contribution is not immediately profitable, but only makes a location attractive for future generations in the long term,” says Chantzaras. What would Helmut Schmidt say about that?
Cultural buildings of the future, The individual lectures are still available online afterwards for everyone. Participation is free of charge. Registration is required at www. cultural buildings. net; The architect as an artist? Lecture: Matthias Sauerbruch, Academy of Fine Arts, Max-Joseph-Platz 3, Wed., Dec 15, 7 p.m., free admission, 2-G-plus proof