Visiting Countryside / The Future is to enter a kaleidoscope of a
futurist hive-mind. Urbanist architect, Rem Koolhaas and his
think-tank AMO have a theory about the future of humanity, and
it’s not urban. Ascending the Guggenheim’s spiraling interior one
encounters a semiotic collision of visual languages, infographics,
and historical evidence that build to a dizzying information overload.
Silos of thought exploration are eroded as the building transforms
into a petri dish for visitors to participate in cross-pollinating ideation,
think psychedelic science fair. Towering walls of text, punctuated by
a painting of a cow, urgently ask seemingly simple questions:
“Is Architecture always for humans?"
"Can Architecture serve other species? Animals? Robots?”
“Who thought of free time?”
“What happens to an alarm that nobody hears?”
“Does living require courage?”
Years in the making, this exhibit is the brainchild of the think-tank AMO,
the twin of Koolhaas' OMA (Office for Metropolitan Architecture). For
Koolhaas and his dream team The Countryside represents the next
great frontier. One aspect of the exhibit that captures their collective
curiosity reads, “As soon as we leave the urban condition behind us,
we confront newness and the profoundly unfamiliar. What we collect
here is evidence of new thinking [...] new ways of planning, [...]
exploring, [...] acting with media, [...] owning, paying rent, [...]
welcoming, new ways in which the countryside is inhabited today.”
Countryside / The Future is less an exhibit of art than an exploration
of ideas and a collaborative simulation of our collective future.
Countryside / The Future was closed to the public on March 18th, due
to the outbreak of Covid-19. With most of the worlds cities in lockdown the
countryside has never been more appealing, and may indeed hold The Future.
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