Focus on Franckviertel
14.03.2007The “Revisit Linz Franckviertel” exhibition in the afo architekturforum oberösterreich is open to the public since March 14.
A group of architecture students at the Linz Art University took a close look at Franckviertel and confronted some issues having to do with public spaces: How does Franckviertel differ from Linz’s other districts? Who uses the public spaces there and in what forms? Which urban architectural structures are present there? The group’s findings are now being presented at the afo architekturforum oberösterreich (Architecture Forum Upper Austria) and, beginning March 28, in the Volkshaus Franckviertel community center.Speakers at the vernissage on March 10 stressed that the students’ inquiry has opened up new perspectives on urban planning. Prof. Roland Gnaiger of the Linz Art University stated that the actual mission facing architects in Linz’s Franckviertel is designing structures’ content, which he contrasted to the architect’s classical task of simply erecting structures. For Martin Heller, architecture, public spaces and urban planning are important themes of the Capital of Culture year when they are understood in terms of the environments occupied by human beings and when they thus give utmost consideration to the inhabitants themselves. According to City Councilman Klaus Luger, Franckviertel is in numerous respects actually a “one-of-a-kind ‘maverick’ among Linz neighborhoods,” a thesis he illustrated with many historical and statistical examples.
The exhibition runs March 14-24, 2007 (Wednesday to Saturday: 2-5 PM; Friday: 2-8 PM).
