Deadline Architects (Matthew Griffin, Britta Jürgens) Slender Bender http://www.deadline.de

participants

“The change from the industrial age to the Information age is not connected with obvious dramatic effekts as the changes brought by the industrial revolution. The mechanical age was marked by physical technological changes in transportation production and construction, which directly changed cities. The information age is far more ephemeral by nature, and the changes it causes are subtle, and just beginning to emerge. Our projects are experiments with these emerging information age structures. We are interested in the relationship between physical structure and social structure, and with each project we explore the influence these fields have on each other, hoping that through careful observation we will foresee some of the coming changes in the built environment. Our work addresses the following two questions: How is information and communication technology influencing our cities? To what extent can these technologies replace traditional hierarchical planning?” Deadline architects, 2003

Deadline Architects on „Slender Bender“ – defying conventional building processes and advancing an architecture of self sufficiency. The basic point being that the organisational structures behind a building (clients, banks, and planning regs) have more influence on the design than the architects would like to admit, and that by learning how to take more control on these processes we can change practice. The presentation includes an examples outside the work of deadline architects - the apartment-house „sarg fabrik“ in Wien.

Deadline – Favorite Quote (untranslatable)
“Say ‘Fuck You’ to the world once in a while. You have every right to. Stop thinking, worrying, looking over your shoulder, wondering, doubting, fearing, hurting, hoping for some easy way out, struggling, gasping, confusing, itching, scratching, mumbling, bumbling, grumbling, humbling, stumbling, rumbling, rambling, gambling, tumbling, scumbling, scrambling, hitching, hatching, bitching, moaning, groaning, honing, boning, horse-shitting, hairsplitting, nitpicking, piss-tickling, nose-sticking, ass-gouging, eyeball-poking, finger-pointing. Alleyway-sneaking, long waiting, small stepping, evil-eyeing, back-scratching, searching, perching, besmirching, grinding, grinding, grinding away at yourself, Stop it and just DO.”

Biography

Matthew Griffin (1996) and Britta Jürgens (1963) founded Deadline in 1992. Since then they have been experimenting on the edges of architectural production as curators, artists, computer programmers, property developers, city planners, and architects. Their main interest lies in the structural changes (technological, social and economic) taking place at the end of the mechanical age, and their particular effects on architecture and urban planning. Their projects, - Most Recent Space Race (1999), Templace.com (2000 – 2003), Slender (1999-2002) and Bender (1999 – 2004) - explore these structural changes in different media, ranging from web systems to temporary installations and buildings.