The Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design (HfG) is happy to announce to be an official partner of this year's Festival of Architecture in Massa, Italy.

Prof. Céline Condorelli and Hanne König from HfG Karlsruhe are teaching a seminar called Performing landscapes of leisure and extraction: quarries and other colonies in cooperation with the festival of architecture in Massa, which will take place from April 6-13, 2025.

The seminar proposes performance as an entry into the relationship between extractivism (of bodies and of mining) and landscape, and will explore the landscapes of leisure and extraction in north Tuscany. Marina di Massa’s beach is dotted with ‘Marine (Holiday) Colonies’, mostly designed during the first half the 20th century and the twenty years of fascism, behind which lies the huge hole of the Carrara quarry, excavated since Roman times, and which has produced more marble than anywhere else in the world. We will visit this place twice, first at the end of October for a site research visit, and secondly during the Festival of Architecture Post-Colonia in April 2025, during which we will stage a series of public programmes and performances resulting from the seminar.

The seminar seeks to support students (in groups or on their own) in the development of performance and time-based events, performative objects or installations, which will be part of the public programme of the Architecture Festival in April 2025. Teaching will be split between practice-based and reading sessions (each bi-weekly), and monthly colloquiums, and supported with individual meetings and talks. Developing an understanding of landscape as performative, we will try different methods and techniques in order to develop tools for mapping, scoring, instructions, recordings and other forms of performative interrelationships. Accompanied by theoretical and artistic texts, we will focus on how processes of observation generate and rehearse actions and performances. Participating students of HfG Karlsruhe are:

Hannah Bingen
Sophia Rosa Bollinger
Chelsea Kim
Jiayu Liu
Peter Oellerich
Emil Schönert
Yanina Sharipova
Laura Waterstradt
Laura Weser
Maximilian Zschiesche

About the Festival of Architecture and this year's approach

A tower as a vantage point and an international, interdisciplinary approach to reflect on the architecture and landscape of the northern coast of Tuscany (Italy), starting from the physical and symbolic legacy of former seaside colonies. Once places of care and holiday for the children of Italy’s industrial workers, these structures are now largely abandoned, embodying the crisis of industrial, social, and environmental systems tied to extractive economic models.

The programme – coming soon – weaves together perspectives and expertise from architecture, art, ecology, and social innovation through workshops, installations, walks, stories, guided tours, films, and performances. It offers an opportunity to explore spatial and symbolic voids, and to stimulate reflection on possible transitions.

Save the date! POST COLONIA - Festival of Architectures and Imaginaries in Transition 🗓️ 6–13 April, Marina di Massa (MS).

POST COLONIA is supported by Festival Architettura - 3rd Edition, promoted by the Directorate-General for Contemporary Creativity of the Italian Ministry of Culture.

Artistic Direction: Martina Angelotti and Emanuele Guidi
Lead Organisation: LAMA Impresa Sociale
Partners: DOC Scs, Orizzontale
International Partners: CIVA - Center for Architecture in Brussels, Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design (HfG), Plateau Urbain