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Monday, 21 January 2008 | Levent OZLER
Housing Shortages: the Minimum Subsistence Level Housing of Today
5. International Bauhaus Award 2008
With the Bauhaus Award 2008, the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation continues its research into "Updating Modernism". In doing so, a central topic of the historic Bauhaus is taken up and introduced into a contemporary discourse: solutions are sought for the minimum subsistence level housing of today.
The second CIAM (International Congress of Modern Architecture) conference in Frankfurt am Main in 1929 took the title "The minimum subsistence level housing".
Here, new models and prototypes for small apartments were presented and discussed by, among others, the Bauhaus directors Walter Gropius and Hannes Meyer.
Almost eight decades later, this subject is more pertinent than ever. Societies worldwide are confronted - in social, ecological and cultural terms - with housing shortages. Above all, living in urban poverty leads to existential housing problems. Around 50 % of the world population currently lives in cities. Approximately half of these again live in shantytowns or slums or are homeless, and that at a time when essential resources are becoming increasingly scarce.
In Western Europe, a critical housing problem, where a disproportionately high proportion of income is sometimes paid out in rent, currently affects at least 10 % of the population. The homeless, subtenants, residents and asylum seekers in emergency housing; long-term unemployed, young people without qualifications; emigrants, migrants, students, low-earners, retirees; single parents and families with many children all have difficulties finding housing in cities.
The Bauhaus Award 2008 will look at the social standards of the modern age in the field of housing and examine these in the light of the current housing crisis. The issue at the heart of the Award will be: poverty and housing shortages. Design-based plans or concepts and models or scenarios for housing policy are sought for minimum subsistence level housing. The focus will be on the development or design of affordable housing options in urban space. Candidates are expected to explore the existential standards and social requirements of the societies on which they base their Award entry.
Individuals or groups may enter work developed in the last five years - design outlines, plans, research projects, films, concepts, etc. Participants may include designers, artists and researchers who are under 40 years of age by the project completion date. The first prize is 6,000 Euro the second 4,000 Euro and the third 2,000 Euro. Entries may be submitted from 1st January 2008. The closing date for entries is 31st March 2008. Prizes will be presented on 21st June 2008 at the Bauhaus Dessau Foundation.
The Foundation will host a colloquium on the topic of "Housing shortages" on 25th January 2008.
Closing date for entries: 31st March 2008
Presentation of prizes: 21st June 2008
Further information on entries for the Bauhaus Award 2008: http://www.bauhaus-dessau.de/en/projects.asp?p=award2008
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