July brings a packed calendar of architecture and design exhibitions, installations, and public art openings around the globe. The month’s agenda ranges from immersive light installations and garden festivals to museum retrospectives that explore cultural history.
At ARoS Aarhus Art Museum in Denmark, a new James Turrell skyspace titled “As Seen Below — The Dome” is now open. The 4,000-square-metre subterranean building represents the latest expansion by the architecture firm Schmidt Hammer Lassen. It frames a 16-metre-high, 40-metre-diameter immersive light installation that retracts its cap to frame the sky. The firm describes the experience as a passage from light into darkness beneath the ground that builds anticipation for the encounter with light and sky from within the dome.
In Quebec, the International Garden Festival at Jardins de Métis — Reford Gardens continues its 27th edition with the theme “Mapping Sensitivity.” Five international installations explore connections to nature. Hugh Taylor’s “Again, a Garden” uses fallen logs and pollinator species to show how decay and life are integral parts of a single system. Meanwhile, Tainai-Meguri by Measured Architecture Inc. and Tamotsu Tongu translates the ubiquitous digital screen into a “cave made tangible by a sweeping arbour.”
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The Vitra Campus in Germany also hosts a new setting project. Brussels-based architect Bas Smets completed the Water Garden in June, situated directly in front of Frank Gehry’s Vitra Design Museum. Smets sees the work as part of a climate-resilient re-imagining of the site, which will eventually see renaturalized green spaces replace sealed surfaces. The garden features three ceramic shark heads by Hella Jongerius rising from the water. These sculptures ask visitors to question the conventions of beauty, joy, and abundance represented by the Greek Graces.
Modernism and Queer History
The Museum of Modern Art in New York presents “Architects of Liberation: Modernism in Western Africa.” The exhibition examines how nations in the region used architecture to project new images of public life and national identity following independence. It spans seven countries, featuring projects like Ghana’s Africa Pavilion at the Accra Trade Fair and the Centre International du Commerce Extérieur du Sénégal. Many of the objects and architects are presented publicly for the first time, helping recover a body of modern architecture often left out of the Eurocentric canon.
In Toronto, the Lassonde Art Trail Opening Season has begun at Biidaasige Park. The city’s most ambitious art initiative includes new installations like Oluseye’s “Crown Act.” The work emerges from the ground as a buried chain made of wood with a cowrie shell at its centre. It draws inspiration from Ontario’s connection to the Underground Railroad and references escape maps sometimes concealed within the braided hairstyles of enslaved women.
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Designers are also using space to explore social themes. The Barcelona practice TAKK created the “Entrate” exhibition at Rome’s MAXXI museum. Con-Vivere translates serious themes like climate change and patriarchy into a setting that proposes new ways of co-existing. The installation features a cradle-like welcome station, a jacuzzi “water parliament,” and a communal sofa. It includes a harvest table where vegetables from a vertical farm above are served as they ripen.
For those interested in history, the Toronto Society of Architects is running a walking tour of Church and Wellesley Village this month. The tour traces how the neighbourhood became a centre of queer public life through the built environment. It considers the pressures facing the area today, including development and inclusion. The timing is particularly relevant as Church Street tests a pedestrian-only setup this summer, adding new layers to conversations about the neighborhood’s future.
