Point 0 Screens for Free at The Cooper Union

Thursday, September 28, 2017 at 6:30 p.m. ET

The Cooper Union’s The Frederick P. Rose Auditorium
41 Cooper Square (on Third Avenue between 6th and 7th Streets)
New York, NY 10003

POINT 0 is an oral history film done with a twist: architects reflect on their initiations into the culture of architecture education in a kind of ritual performance. Asked to recall vivid memories and relevant experiences from their education, they perform a few physical actions and tell their stories. Although filmed in front of a neutral background, specificities quickly emerge: a wide range of responses are juxtaposed, revealing essential preoccupations within three generations of architects. This is not just text as information: you see the person and you hear their story.

This film is a special collaboration between an architect (Christina Condak) and a theater team (Toxic Dreams), which led to its unique quality. It is accessible to anyone interested in making and thinking.

Christina Condak holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Hobart & William Smith Colleges, and a Bachelor of Architecture from The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture of the Cooper Union, with an award from the New York Society of Architects upon graduation in 1994. Born in Manhattan, she lives and teaches architectural design at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna since 1997. She was a visiting design professor at Cornell University in 2002-03 and at the Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Paris-Malaquais in 2016-17. Condak shares a small architecture practice, Nurarchitektur (i.e. simply architecture), with Peter Leeb in Vienna since 1997.

Toxic Dreams is a Vienna based experimental performance company known for creating numerous original dramatic works. Founded in 1997 by Kornelia Kilga (producer) and Yosi Wanunu (director) the group is an ensemble based company, with artists from various disciplines who make work for theatre, dance, performance, and video and digital media. Michael Strohmann, a musician and sound engineer, is also a member of the company.

The project was supported by the (Bundeskanzleramt) Federal Chancell

The film screening is free and open to the public. To watch a trailer, please visit https://player.vimeo.com/video/228045583. Architects interviewed in Point 0 include Nic Clear, Dieter Dietz, Urs Egg, Elise Feiersinger, Catherine Anne Fleith, Françosie Fromonot, Mark Gilbert, Stefan Gruber, Peter Leeb, Bärbel Müller, Anna Polpelka, Lisa Schmidt-Colinet, Nasrine Seraji, Dietmar Steiner, Hannes Stiefel, Wolfgang Tschapeller, and Bernd Vlay.