FRANK HAVERMANS
TOFUD#Amsterdam Zuidas (photo: Ron Zijlstra)
www.frankhavermans.nl
Frank Havermans is an artist and designer. He was invited to participate in the Zuidas Free Spaces AIR 2010 by the VMZ’s partner institute The Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture (Fonds BKVB).
Frank Havermans was born in Breda and studied architectural design at the Hogeschool voor Beeldende Kunsten St. Joost in Breda. In 1993 he won the Public Award of the BNI for his graduation project Polders. In 2003 he was selected for the long list of the Prix de Rome for Sculpture. In 2006 he won the Houtarchitectuurprijs, an award for innovative construction in wood, with the artists’ studio KAPKAR/TAW-BW-5860. For that same project, Havermans was nominated for the AM NAi Award. In 2007 he received an honourable mention for the Nederlandse Bouwprijs award, in the category ‘Buildings’. In 2007 he participated in the exhibition ‘Tangible Traces’ for the 7th Architecture Biennial of São Paulo. ‘Tangible Traces’ was shown in Vienna and Hong Kong in 2008 and in Jakarta and Arnhem in 2009. In the summer of 2009, Havermans participated in the exhibition ‘Retreat’ in Fort Asperen in Acquoy, at the invitation of organizers Ben van Berkel and Caroline Bos, UNStudio Amsterdam. In January 2010, a book on his work, Architectonische constructies was brought out by NAi Publishers.
Havermans makes low-tech architectural installations that are functional and/or otherwise. With simple, relatively cheap and readily available sheet material and uncomplicated tools, he creates specially designed spatial constructions in a liberating, stimulating manner – without bringing in any contractors or technicians – in which he gives the characteristics of the material a structural application. He makes no distinction between an autonomous work and commissions for applied design. Havermans’ long-term project examining the urban planning of cities and urban areas, TOFUD – his Temporary Office For Urban Development – was presented for the first time in the Van Abbemuseum.
Results of the Residency: TOFUD#Amsterdam Zuidas
The project at the Zuidas also originates from Frank Havermans’ TOFUD, which he set up in the chapel. Here he worked on a different perspective for the future of the Zuidas urban design project. As an alternative to the scale model displayed in the Project Bureau, he built his own three-dimensional ideas and discussion model of the Zuidas. In this gigantic table model that is ‘growing’ out of his TOFUD, he shows that a city is an organically stratified whole with a dynamic, complex infrastructure.
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