The living legend of architecture, Yona Friedman, gave an online Global Lecture to our Global Summer School students. In it, he reviewed his long and distinguished career as an architect, urban planner and thinker.

Also, he presented his latest book “Yona Friedman: The Dilution of Architecture“, that explores Friedman’s thinking process, taking readers through the projects and movements in which he has been involved, from the construction of ephemeral emergency architecture in disaster zones, architectural utopianism, his concept of the “Ville Spatiale“, up to his latest proposals of auto-planification, improvisation and architecture without buildings. Yona Friedman was accompanied by Manuel Orazi and Nader Seraj. Take a look on the lecture here:

 

 

 

You can also check the Storify of the best social media activity around the lecture:

 

Bios:
Yona Friedman (born 1923), studied architecture in Budapest. After having escaped capture and deportation from Hungary by the Nazis during World War II, he lived in Israel for nearly ten years where he completed his education at Technion – Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, and also worked as a builder to earn his living. He has been living and working in Paris since 1957.

Manuel Orazi (born 1974), completed his PhD in history of architecture at Ca’Foscari University of Venice in 2007. He is an editor with Quodlibet publishers in Macerata and teaches theory and history of contemporary architecture at the universities of Bologna and Ferrara. He also regularly contributes to books and magazines.

Nader Seraj (born 1975), is an architect and independent researcher based in Geneva. He studied at the Academy of Architecture in Mendrisio, the Architectural Association in London, and the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in Barcelona. He curated the exhibition “Yona Friedman: Genesis of a Vision” at EPFL’s Archizoom gallery in 2012.