design magazine

The exhibition “Rapport. Experimental Spatial Structures” offers new insights into the interdisciplinary approach of the internationally acclaimed architectural office J. Mayer H. For the first time, the team has developed a walk-in installation for the museum’s 10-metre high entrance area. Walls and floor are clad in carpeting, on which data security patterns are printed in black and grey. The work’s space-consuming concept negates the strict geometry of the entrance hall. The considerably enlarged, repeating patterns produce a flickering impression and transform the white cube into a playful scenario of interpermeating forms and structures. Supplementary three-dimensional models translate the two-dimensional patterns into concrete forms.

“Rapport. Experimental Spatial Structures by J. Mayer H.” continues the Berlinische Galerie’s series of site-specific interventions by contemporary, border-crossing Berlin architects; this particular show follows up presentations of Kuehn Malvezzi (Field of Letters, 2004), magma architecture (Head-in│im Kopf, 2007) and Raumlaborberlin (Soft Solution, 2010/2011).

The title “Rapport” is intended to be ambiguous. As a specialist German-language term from textile manufacturing, it refers to the serial pattern of the installation. On the other hand, in the military field the term “Rapport” means a “dispatch”, while in psychology it describes a human relationship in which those involved convey something to the others. In this sense it also refers to the starting material of the installation: data security patterns, which are used, for example, on the inside of envelopes. In this case, they stand for confidential communication between two parties.