A bearded hippy wearing only his underpants emerges from what appears to be a subterranean concrete bunker. He's followed by a shaggy man in overalls, a topless woman with long hair, and another, and another, like clowns from a Volkswagen. A voiceover informs us that these people are leaving behind an "indescribably large house...with all the possible comforts, and with all the pieces of modern furniture on the market...built following all ancient and modern styles, forming a homogenous and pleasant whole."

The movie, Ceremony, is one of five films (together called Fundamental Acts) that the Italian avant-garde architecture collective Superstudio planned in the early 1970s to communicate their radical vision of an ideal world: one devoid of architecture. This vision is chronicled in Superstudio: Life Without Objects, an ambitious retrospective of the firm's conceptual work from 1966 to 1978 currently spread across several New York galleries.


- bill 2-18-2004 10:26 pm

William Menking is one of the recent co-founders of The Architect's Newspaper.
- anonymous (guest) 2-19-2004 12:29 am [add a comment]





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