Jürgen Mayer H. Livres

J. Mayer H. und Partner, Architekten focus on works at the intersection of architecture, communication and new technology. Recent international projects include Metropol Parasol, the redevelopment of the Plaza de la Encarnación in Seville, Spain; the Court of Justice in Hasselt, Belgium; and several public and infrastructure projects in Georgia, for example an airport in Mestia, the border checkpoint in Sarpi, and three rest stops along the highway in Gori and Locchini. Other exciting projects are coming up soon: the Karlsruhe 300 jubilee pavilion KA300 in the royal gardens; a parking garage façade in Miami, Florida; the FOM University and the Rhein740 residential high-rise in Düsseldorf; and VOLT, a new retail and experience complex in the heart of Berlin. From urban planning schemes and buildings to installation work and objects with new materials, the relationship between the human body, technology, and nature form the background for a new production of space.

Sadar + Vuga is a Slovenian architecture office that caused an international sensation even with its fi rst building, the quarters of the Slovenian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, realized in Ljubljana in 1999. Since then, the office-with its unmistakable and charismatic architectural language-has secured a place for itself in the international architecture scene. Having been able to realize the majority of their projects in Ljubljana, Sadar + Vuga have made a strong impact on the contemporary urban texture of the Slovenian capital city like very few architects before them. Even so, their projects quite consciously forego adhering to a homogeneous formal language. Rather, each of them develops its expression from aprecise interpretation of its particular contextual and programmatic circumstances. Instead of simply creating spaces for objects representing pre-formulated lifestyles, Sadar + Vuga's buildings make systematic pinpricks that stimulate our aesthetic power of judgement. Sadar + Vuga see their architecture as a perceptual catalyst for the formation of our weltanschauung, the way we look at the world. And they want to make us look at the world-especially the one between buildings-in a different way, so that we can also act differently in it.

German artist Jürgen Mayer H. (born 1965) collects the printed patterns used by banks to encrypt passcodes and PIN numbers in letters to customers. Having traced the practice of personal data protection back to 1913, he uses these preprints as the basis for buildings, drawings, sculptures and design objects. Wirrwarr features 100 patterns from the Mayer H.'s extensive collection.

With Metropol Parasol, J. MAYER H. Architects have created a new landmark for the city of Seville. The design by the renowned architectural office received first prize in the competition for the redevelopment of the Plaza de la Encarnación at the center of the medieval district of the capital of Andalusia. Metropol Parasol has the potential to turn the Plaza into a new, contemporary urban center in a quarter that was long neglected. The building complex, with its large, parasol-like structures, contains a museum featuring archeological finds in the basement; an indoor market on the ground floor; an elevated square for events, bars, restaurants; and a panoramic walkway on the roof of the parasol. The multifunctional Metropol Parasol signals an initial step in the dynamic development of cultural and commercial facilities at the heart of Seville.

J. MAYER H. Architects, founded in Berlin in 1996 by Jürgen Mayer H., has won a number of awards for their extraordinary work. In recent years, they have created a furor with attention-getting buildings such as the new commons for the Universität Karlsruhe or the AdA1 offices in Hamburg. In particular, Metropol Parasol, a gigantic structure for the market place in the heart of old Seville, has made J. MAYER H. Architects one of the offices most discussed by architecture critics. Edited by Henry Urbach and Cristina Steingräber, this is the first book to present the entire oeuvre of J. MAYER H., starting with research and moving through design to project development, and culminating in the actual building itself. A number of renowned authors, such as Rolf Fehlbaum, Andres Lepik, John Paul Ricco, Ilka und Andreas Ruby, Felicity D. Scott, Henry Urbach, und Philip Ursprung take a variety of approaches toward positioning the office's work in today's international architecture scene. (German edition ISBN 978-3-7757-2222-3) Exhibition schedule: San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, February-May 2009