Celebrating Women Of Change At UQAM’s Centre De Design
BUONE NUOVE Exhibition captures the essence of women creating legacies in art and architecture.
Women are true trailblazers in every field they enter. To commemorate some incredible women in architecture, UQAM’s Centre de Design is thrilled to host the renowned architectural exhibition BUONE NUOVE.
The acclaimed exhibition features the writings and work of numerous female architects from Italy and Quebec, and from elsewhere in Canada and around the world, who have revolutionized the profession. BUONE NUOVE: Women Architects of Change seeks to provide inspiring role models for a new generation of city builders by demonstrating how women and women-led collectives have improved the standards of modern and contemporary design.
The exhibition comprises four sections. The touring section, “Stories of Italian Architects,” highlights the accomplishments of 21 outstanding Italian women who have made their mark and contributed to the transformation of the profession. After its showings in Stockholm, Doha, New Delhi, Berlin and Toronto, the touring section of the exhibition is currently on display in Montreal.
This portion is told through a series of four huge tables that include sketches, drawings, movies and other documents, ranging from work by Lina Bo Bardi to that of Gae Aulenti, from the internationally recognized post-war designers to up-and-coming female practitioners.
A selection of furniture by designers and architects Aulenti, Nanda Vigo, Anna Ferrieri Castelli, Franca Helg, and Cini Boeri, in addition to a component of the exhibit dedicated to the “Golden Age of Design” demonstrates the extremely broad scope of the architects’ work in post-war Italy.
The Pipistrello lamp and the Primavera armchair are two examples of their classic designs, which blend modernity and craftsmanship and are still manufactured by Kartell, Martinelli Luce, Acerbis, and Bonacina today, bearing witness to their long- lasting industrial success.
Finally, the touring section incorporates “Practices in Italy” with pieces by Kazuyo Sejima, Liz Diller, and Zaha Hadid that highlight the contributions of six globally recognized architects who finished noteworthy projects in Italy in the first two decades of the twenty-first century.
The touring exhibit also features several video interviews that reveal the perspectives and narratives of women revolutionizing architecture through activities like as activism, scholarship, writing, curation, academic leadership and philanthropy, as well as investigations into the connection between gender and place.
The exhibition also includes a local component that highlights work from Quebec and Ontario. During its September 2024 showing at Toronto Metropolitan University another local feature, “Inspiring Practices,” featured fifteen women architects based in Toronto. Samples of the work of sixteen outstanding Québécoise architects has been included in the Montreal edition of the show, with some of their most recent initiatives demonstrating the uniqueness and excellence of Quebec practices.
Another fascinating component, the “Postcard Initiative,” asks participants to celebrate women in architecture by sending in photographs and text so that they can be transformed into postcards and added to the exhibition.
A timeline covering the past century highlights some of the significant contributions and landmark accomplishments made by outstanding women in Canada and around the world in the field of architecture. The chronology contrasts these successes with regional and international socio- political events.
Spanning more than a century, this expansive vision of history reflects on the role of female architects and the creatively fresh viewpoints they bring to architecture. The BUONE NUOVE Exhibition at UQAM’s Centre de Design is undoubtedly a unique representation of art’s immortality preserved by incredible women of change.
