Curatorial Statement

Family has never been homogeneous, and it has never been simply “nuclear.” Many of us live with our extended family; countless consider friends their family, while others want to live alone, or with roommates who are mostly strangers. Some of us would like to age gracefully; others want to play, and many want to work from home. Love takes different forms, and it includes couples without children, single parents, and those in polyamorous relationships. Households come in many shapes, and yet, architecture has continued to insist on one-size-fits-all. Neutrality has proven to be exclusionary and has not served us well.

The House Transformed calls for imagining new typologies which provide a home for households that do not fit the limited concept of the nuclear family. Following Emanuele Coccia’s premise that “…we build homes to give a form of intimacy to the portion of the world – comprising objects, people, animals, plants, atmospheres, events, images and memories – that makes happiness possible,” the exhibition modestly focuses on the scale of one household, and does not attempt to address the complex issues of large-scale housing projects. Centering on the realities of an intimate small scale which supports our daily life, each project imagines powerful alternatives to the status quo.

In the exhibition, architectural concepts of model and type are intertwined. If type is to be repeated, and model to be emulated, these two ideas turn out not to be far apart. In The House Transformed drawings, models and a few buildings speculate about culturally embedded domestic ideas often left at the margins of our conversation about the power of architecture.

Exhibition Participants: adamo-faiden, Agency—Agency, Akima Brackeen, Al Borde, all(zone), BALSA CROSETTO PIAZZI, Black Box Research Group / Atelier Office, Cameron Wu, Cazú Zegers, Chenchow Little Architects, clara sola-morales studio, Common Accounts, COMTE/MEUWLY, Current Interests, Daisy Ames, Diagonal Thoughts, Equipo de Arquitectura, Erin Besler, ERGO Architects, Florencia Pita & Co., Förstberg Ling, French 2D, Heide & von Beckerath, Now Here, The LADG, LLOSA CORTEGANA arquitectos, LTL Architects and Guy Nordenson and Associates, MALL, MOS with E. Coccia, MPdL Studio, Neri&Hu Design and Research Office, Oshinowo Studio, Preston Scott Cohen, Stan Allen Architect, Steven Holl Architects, Studio Barnes, studio:indigenous, Studio Sean Canty, Tato Architects, TEN, Tham & Videgård, VTN Architects, WILLIAMSONWILLIAMSON

Exhibition Credits

Curator: Mónica Ponce de León
Assistant Curators: Shoshana Torn and Massimo Giannone
Graphic Design: Christina Huang
Exhibition Design: MPdL Studio: Mónica Ponce de León, Massimo Giannone, Shoshana Torn
Public Programming: Courtney Coffman
Exhibition Production: Kira McDonald
Exhibition Fabrication: Marie Baretsky, Sean Rucewicz, Olivia Ahmadi, Bill Tansley, John Hunter
Exhibition Assistants: Tyler Gray; Aidan Lozano; Saaya Perera; Nicole Teichner; Aonor Washington; Jon Charette; April Dong; Foivos Geralis; Ming Rou Han; Jordan Loofs; Chenkun Ma; Ian St. John; Lucia Tian; Samet Yilmaz
Model Assistants: Elina Chen; Zoe King Man Cheung; Kyra McLaughlin; Lia Mondavi; Stephanie Rosas; Beatriz Saldana; Chandler Yicong Shan; Robert Williams
Installation Assistants: Ian Byers-Gamber; Tayla Roberge; Troy Sewell; Sam Bellamy

Special Thanks to: Allison Wenner, Courtney Coffman, Jeanette Turner, Kate Harmon, Preston Scott Cohen, Cynthia Davidson, Sylvia Lavin and Sylvester Black, as well as the Princeton School of Architecture Staff

This exhibition is made possible by the Jean Labatut Memorial Lectures in Architecture and Urban Planning Fund.