A DREAM IS NOT A DREAM UNTIL IT IS DREAMT BY THE COMMUNITY

Your editor-in-chief visits the construction site of SA's Freedom Park Museum, commissioned through a consultative process advertised after an international competition did not yield a clear winner, and asks project architect DIETER BRANDT of OCA, "is it going to be any good?"

DA: Please tell us a little about the background of the competition process and your involvement in the project?

DB: I had no involvement in the competition phase per se, or Phase One, the Gardens of Remembrance. The collaboration between GAPP, MMA and MRA known as the Office of Collaborative Architects (OCA) were eventually awarded the commission (after a failed two-stage competition which did not "answer the brief in the way they would have liked..." ) on the basis of the merits of a design that placed the museum at the base of the hill, and the gardens on the top, unfettered by buildings. This was deemed the most appropriate use of the site and almost a subversion of the monumentality of the Voortrekker Monument and Union Buildings to which the site relates.

My involvement in the project developed separately to the competition and really started in 2005. After being involved in Cape Town’s BP competition with Kruger Roos Architects, I spent some time in Europe and after unsuccessfully trying to get work with the architect Maurice Nio I returned to South Africa.

DA: Seems that was a blessing in disguise then?

DB: Maybe! What transpired was a job offer later in 2005 from MMA. Mphethi Morojele was one of my examiners for my B Arch Degree. I was in my studio at the time and he called to ask me to work on Freedom Park. So I eventually moved from Cape Town to Johannesburg and had my first meeting with Jeremy Rose and Mphethi on Phase 2 of the project.

DA: Tell us a bit more about what was built in Phase One, and what you are building in Phase Two? I believe there was an Intermediary Phase between One and Two too?

Phase One was in fact the establishment of the Township Salvokop Extension 1 and the servicing thereof. The township site was made up of two erven belonging to the city and Transnet. The Transnet land was categorised for rail use, and the city erven had not yet been classified. The Township is not yet proclaimed! We are operating on a section 7/6 until the last pieces are placed.

‘Isvivane’, a memorial element part of phase 1, is situated on the eastern side of Freedom Park– a resting place for the spirits of those who died in the struggles for humanity and freedom. The Intermediary Phase is constituted of the elements Isivivane, Sikhumbuto (Wall of names, the Sanctuary, eternal flame, amphitheatre, and the hall of leaders), and Moshate. Check http://www.freedompark.co.za/ for more information on these elements. I am Project Architect for Phase 2. This phase is a Museum and a Pan African Archive known as //Hapo, which means “a dream is only a dream once it has been dreamt by the community”,.

DA: What has been the most complex part of the project from a procedural point of view? (politics/budget/egos/landscape designers/exhibit designers)?

DB: The client body is a Trust, with a representative board. There is also the Department of Public Works (DPW), the Department of Arts and Culture (DAC) and the Presidency’s office, all of which have interests in Freedom Park, so initially navigating the design concept through a quagmire of committees was procedurally complex! We had an internal joke that “a design is not a design until it was designed by the committee”.

I have sat in and presented at Phase Two Committee meetings, Strategic Committees, History Committees, Archive Committees, Board meetings, Sub-Com’s and the list goes on, and then there are the advisors…! That said I feel I have a deeper understanding of a prevailing management culture, a culture that stems from the notion of legotla, whereby each voice is heard. This is a more democratic process than the western dogma of executive decision making.

The core team of consultants is relatively typical for any building project, but there are consultants who are unique to museum’s. We work with the exhibition consultants Thinc based in NYC who recently completed work on the California Academy of Sciences and won the competition for the National September Memorial Museum at the World Trade Centre . We have also worked with Visual - Acuity who provide design guidance and operational advice to clients in areas of new-media, visualization & ICT technology.

There are natural tensions between the scope and budgets of the exhibition designers, architects and landscape architects, and there have been differences, but we have found a tremendous amount of support from the client to allow the building itself to be rather poetic and drive an expression of the brief itself, as opposed to being merely a receptacle. What is also difficult is if the goal posts constantly shift as a result of funding. A budget is always constraining, but in our case where the posts have shifted with the luxury of time I believe it has afforded us the opportunity to reflect and interrogate the brief. You however cannot separate the effect that the budget has on the brief, and in turn on the design process.

DA: I see very contemporary spatial and formal qualities coming through in the design in terms of geometry and materiality. How were these motivated to the client?

In the initial design we worked closely with the architectural brief drafted by Thinc_Acuity. This was a detailed report with adjacencies and areas. Following which the client produced a concept report for Phase 2, looking to reflect the ‘emancipation of the African voice’ more clearly in the design concept. This resulted in the abandonment of the first concept proposals, but in keeping of the basic configuration. It was later in a visit with the client to Credo Mutwa’s traditional homestead in Kuruman that Jeremy Rose produced a sketch of boulders in Credo’s ‘Healing Garden’. This sketch represented the underlying concept, where the architecture is realised a series of boulder like forms in a healing garden.

In this case the healing garden is Freedom Park that seeks to redress the past and begin to form a new collective identity. The boulder concept ties in with the element ‘Isvivane’. The accumulated boulders called ‘Isivivane’, are believed to bring good fortune to long-distance travelers by paying homage to the landscape and all that it ‘contained’. The word contained becomes important in our case where the content begins to inform the ‘container’ on multiple levels.

Other key points derived from the concept report such as African Kinship or ‘Ubuntu’ ,and ‘Freedoms’ give form to the spatial configuration and the programmatic use of the boulders. There is the loose circular configuration of the boulders around the ‘Indigenous Knowledge Systems’ (IKS) Courtyard, and within the landscape element ‘Sentlagha’ (Children’s Garden), a gesture towards an inclusivity of indigenous knowledge and the future children of our nation. ‘Freedoms’, as a concept is structured throughout the interpretive framework of the exhibit, but formally we try and disrupt the chronological sequence of the exhibition content by creating free movement and access in, out, and between the boulders. So you might decide to visit the epoch Nationalism and Struggle, without having to walk through the preceding epoch’s first.

DA: That is a good idea, we structured our Egyptian Museum Competition like that, i.e. ‘hypertextually’. So you mean you can come into the exhibits at any point in ‘time’?

DB: Yes. Similarly content is reflected in the container by a qualitative experience of the exhibition epochs. There is control of sensory experience through light, sound and spatial embodiment in an attempt to reflect qualitatively each of the respective epochs, as well as maintaining the feeling of being inside a boulder. There are strategic openings with views unto the marked exterior landscape i.e. the union buildings.

DA: Tell us about the materiality. Why copper?

DB: The choice of material was copper, a monochromatic sheath. There were other material considerations, but in the end the tussle was between copper-based rheinzink and copper. Both are tailored applications with long life spans up to 100 years. In the end copper was motivated to the client for its patina, an ageing material that captures the sense of ‘ancient’ we were looking for. Copper is mined in Africa.

DA: Has the client understood or bought into the formal qualities, which are quite "Libeskind" , abstract or "deconstructivistic" for lack of a better word?

Client consensus on this matter took some time. Where the initial design encountered a lot of resistance, the boulder idea was one that the client appropriated and could take ownership of. This was of particular importance especially at Board level where we needed buy-in before moving forward and securing additional funding.

We had managed to have the boulder concept approved, but this did not mean that the look and feel had yet been sanctioned. There were client members who felt ‘African Architecture’ was defined by circular geometry, which later evolved into a desire for curvilinear forms. Our current formal proposals were almost derailed at an executive level, when some crucial members who advocated our design proposal were not present at a meeting in question. The Phase Two committee then commissioned a report on geometry in African architecture. We have many different geometric examples such as the pyramids of Egypt, the curvilinear lines of the Great Zimbabwean ruins, the Rock churches in Ethiopia, the rectilinear mosques, and cliff villages of Mali. Though we did drew inspiration locally from the lost city of Mapungubwe, the centre of a pre-Shona kingdom dated 1050 AD to 1270 AD, in the end both the boulders from Credo’s Mutwa’s garden in Kuruman, and the craggy rock type found on our site gave us the confidence that we were heading in the right direction with our forms.

I find any comparison with Libeskind disconcerting. Libeskind comes from totally different position. His seminal piece the Holocaust museum in Berlin was much more involved in the abstract process of drawing - the extraction from beyond, and presenting the absent. The holocaust museum presented a new typology. //Hapo is a new type of architecture for South Africans – but it is not necessarily a new typology. Unfortunately for Libeskind is that I think his work has become repetitive like so many of the other star architects i.e. Gehry, Eisemen, Hadid, etc. It is not to say their work does not hold value, but it has become stylised, and therefore staid. Out of the star architects Herzog de Meuron are still fantastic. They have an artistic approach to their work, giving a longer life to their lexicon I would say. Koolhaus’s programmatic interests are still critical to making architecture sustainable, but there is new school out there, like the Dutch Architect Maurice Nio, or the Spanish Architects Nieto Sabejano who are very inspiring.

DA: What do you believe the impact will be on South African architectural discourse?

Significant! South Africa needed to get to this point so we can move on from the current state of architecture in SA. Formally Freedom Park is breaking boundaries and in particular Phase 2. Boundaries often set by the limitation in the local modes of production, and a fundamental misconception by the public of what defines good architecture. It is said that a piece of architecture is the testament to the client’s will. What has made this special is the client is the government, represented by a trust with a huge amount of political will to make a project that is unique enough to stand the test of those people who have fallen in the name of freedom in SA, and the undeniable hope that exists in most South Africans for a better future. That is a huge task, dreamt by Nelson Mandela, and envisioned by Thabo Mbeki to signify the spirit of a people through the means of architecture.

The trust has steered this message of hope, and looked far and wide not only in SA, but in Africa and abroad in finding a meaningful local manifestation. In the end we drew most of our resources locally to achieve change and creativity. So what I hope is that SA can snap out of the cast that has been ostensibly self-styled by a damaged collective psyche, and move forward in a new form in a similar way that the Spanish have slowly unleashed their creativity following the oppressive regime of General Francisco Franco in Spain.

DA: You sound like the Trust’s best spokesperson to me! When will the project finish? Tell us about Phase Three?

DB: The Intermediary phase is complete and open to the public. Phase 2 is scheduled to be complete in April 2010. This includes a six month exhibit fit-out.

DA: Mum on Phase Three then?

DB: For now

DA: How does it feel to be so young and being project architect for arguably the most important building in South Africa since Constitutional Hill?

It is important to recognise the significance of milestone projects such as the Walter Sisulu Square of Dedication, Constitution Hill, Lillie’s Leaf or Freedom Park for both their failures and successes. How we read the local lexicon of architecture allows us to redefine our forthcoming projects and furthermore our own identities.

I feel privileged. It has not only been an honour to be part of the Freedom Park project, but also to have worked directly with the associated directors of the collaborative, namely, Chris Kroese, Jeremy Rose and Mphethi Morojele, and our project team (Simon Bird, Eugene Marais, Katlego Makoe, Teboho Maphiri, Lyia Tesfaye, Lionel Cumps & Dorah Khoza).

DA: What is next for Dieter Brandt? Do you feel you will ever be involved in as ambitious and important a building locally?

It will take some time before we have such a politically ambitious project again. The private sector will not produce work with so much freedom as they are normally determined by a bottom line. The chapters of history might take a while before producing another project like this. For now and the near future the money will be directed towards the world cup, infrastructure and operations. I think there are many obvious places to look to see how the environment in South Africa will be shaped in the near future i.e. the impact of global warming, the global recession, urbanization, HIV, migrant growth, the infrastructural drive i.e. Guatrain, the new Undersea Cable and so on. SA’s should be disseminating the prospect of these and pitching strategic projects on every scale.

I have no plans as yet and am trying to resist any commitment until after the project is completed, although I am keen on specializing on exhibition type public buildings, hopefully in private practice!

DA: Thanks Dieter, it has been a remarkable tour of the building site and an overwhelming amount of information to digest! All the best with the completion of the project.

DB: Thank you!

ED's note: Freedom Park Phase Two was accelerated last year at the orders of then South African President Thabo Mbeki in order to be completed in time for the inauguration of the new President after elections in 2009. One wonders who Thabo had in mind being inaugurated against such a glittering backdrop? The project is now slated for opening to the public on May 2nd, 2010, in time for the FIFA World Cup.