Autor: OFFICE Kersten Geers David Van Severen
OFFICE Kersten Geers David Van Severen is one of the most interesting and uncompromising young architectural practices at work today. It is renowned for its idiosyncratic architecture, in which utopian and non-realised projects are also customary. It does not invent the architecture, but reflects and considers what architecture can signify and be today, reducing architecture to its bareness and essence. Their architectonic ideas start from geometrical corrections and rather rigid classifications, in order to measure the world as it presents itself to us and allow life to unfold in all its complexities.
OFFICE Kersten Geers David Van Severen was founded in 2002 by Kersten Geers and David Van Severen. In ten years of practice OFFICE has gained international recognition with its direct and precise projects. In 2010 they won the Venice Biennale Silver Lion for most promising young architect, and the Belgian Prize for Architecture in 2009, 2013 and 2015. In 2012 an overview of their work and has been published as a 2G monographic issue. Currently OFFICE Kersten Geers David van Severen is working on projects of all scales in Belgium and abroad.
Biography
OFFICE Kersten Geers David Van Severen was established in 2002 by Kersten Geers (Ghent, 1975) and David Van Severen (Ghent, 1978), and has been located in Brussels since 2006.
Geers and Van Severen both studied at the Universiteit Gent and at the Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura in Madrid (ETSAM). Until 2001 Kersten Geers worked for Maxwan/Max.1 Architects (Rotterdam) and from 2001 to 2005 for Neutelings Riedijk Architects (Rotterdam). He has been a tutor various institutions such as the University of Ghent (BE), Columbia University (US), Berlage institute (NL) the Academy of Architecture in Mendrisio (CH), the Harvard Graduate School of Design (US) and Yale School of Architecture (US), and currently holds a position as Associate Professor at the EPFL, Lausanne (CH). He is a founding member of the editorial board of the architecture magazine, San Rocco. David Van Severen has designed and realised various objects, installations, exhibitions and items of furniture since 1995. Until 2004 he worked for the architects Stéphane Beel Architects (Ghent) and Xaveer De Geyter Architects (Brussels), OFFICE Kersten Geers David Van Severen and from 1999 to 2005 for Atelier Maarten Van Severen (Ghent). He has also been a tutor at the Universiteit Gent (BE), the Berlage Institute (NL) and Harvard Graduate School of Design (US), a guest critic at the Technische Universiteit Delft (NL), the Accademia di Architettura in Mendrisio (CH) and Yale School of Architecture (US), and is currently teaching at Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture in Versailles (FR). As OFFICE Kersten Geers David Van Severen they have completed a multitude of projects, ranging from furniture to urban design. They have won the Belgian Prize for Architecture in 2009, 2013 and 2015, the Silver Lion at the 12th Venice Biennial of Architecture (2010) for the Garden Pavilion, and were recently awarded with the Berlin Art Prize for Architecture.
Collaborators (March 2016)
Steven Bosmans, Ir. Architect
Jan Lenaerts, Architect
Bert Rogiers, Ir. Architect
Inga Karen Traustadottir, Architect
Nenad Duric, Architect
Ronan Murray, Architect
Jacopo Lugli, Architect
Yuichiro Onuma, Architect
Anne van Hout, Architect
Justine Rossillion, Architect
Enea Facoetti, Architect
Thomas Mertens, Ir. Architect
Pieter De Walsche, Ir. Architect
Alexander Smedts, Ir. Architect
Edouard Champalle, Architect
Stefaan Jamaer, Ir. Architect
Hugo Mazza
Andrea Pizzini
Rosa Fens
Marlene Oeken
Sahar Safieddine