Screenshot of the “Collection Online” showing search results for Friedrich Kurrent, Josef Lackner, and Hans Puchhammer
Many things come together in an architect’s life: The process that ideally leads to a building, while sometimes also remaining on paper, includes countless plans, sketches, models and documents. Alongside the completed buildings, these form the basis for the investigation and rewriting of architecture history. This is where the Az W comes into play.
To build the extensive Az W Collection, which currently includes 110 donated and bequeathed architects’ estates, it has been important to cultivate relationships with the architects or their descendants. The resulting donations – from the little box inside which each plan came tied with a red ribbon, to whole pallets full of material – are conserved, researched and made accessible in the Az W depot. From now on, large parts of the Az W Collection can also be seen online – the architectural history of Austria has become accessible from all over the world. While conventional museum databases usually only represent individual objects from their collections, the constantly growing Az W Collection Online shows the interconnections between architecture, the individuals involved and the relevant documents and documentation, once again establishing the interrelationships between hundreds of thousands of datapoints in the Collection.
Examplory for the numerous architects in the Collection Online, we would like to highlight three individuals who celebrate, or would have celebrated, their 95th birthdays this year: Friedrich Kurrent (10.09.1931–10.01.2022), Josef Lackner (31.01.1931–13.09.2000) and Hans Puchhammer (b. 13.05.1931). What they have in common is the significance of their work for the history of post-1945 Austrian architecture. Kurrent founded the first ‘boy group’ of architects, workgruppe 4, with his fellow students Otto Leitner, Wilhelm Holzbauer and Johannes Spalt. As a “teacher, activist, exhibitor, explorer, researcher, founder, critic, reader, writer, urbanist, draughtsman and rescuer” (Friedrich Achleitner), he played a decisive role in shaping the architectural landscape of Austria. Puchhammer joined Gunther Wawrik to establish a long-standing partnership. In addition to teaching at the TU Wien (Vienna University of Technology), he has engaged largely in groundbreaking renovation and extension work. Today, he is deeply involved in the transformation of the controversial Hotel Intercont in Vienna. Lackner remained a lone fighter. His buildings adopt striking shapes that emerge from their function and construction rather than from formal considerations.
You can find out more about our three honourees – and a number of other architects – in our Collection Online.
