Jonas von Ostrowski . Studio Nitsche . photos: © Nicolas Wefers . + domusweb
The House With Clear Shapes and a Complex Entrance is part of LOS ANGELES, an art space located in a rural part of central Germany. It’s the first newly built structure on the 3000 square meter plot of land, that is becoming an inhabitable sculpture garden, an all-over-art-work that will develop and grow out of itself. Los Angeles is a place for artists of all genres to stay, work and get in touch with each other and the public. Los Angeles hosts artists’ residencies, exhibitions, workshops, and other cultural events.
Equipped with electricity, water, and heating, artist Jonas von Ostrowski’s first sculpture, the House With Clear Shapes And A Complex Entrance, offers space for up to three people. In its form, materiality, and spatial structure, it proposes a specific relationship between ‘interior’ and ‘exterior’. The design of the House With Clear Shapes And A Complex Entrance is developed from a conceptual floor plan with a sequence of four spaces.
The entrance space, with its airlock-like door, the passage space, the staircase, and lastly, the final living space, create a spatial narration from the outside into the inside. The body of the House With Clear Shapes And A Complex Entrance consists of two stacked geometric volumes – the lower one triangular, the upper one square. The interior spaces result from the overlapping and intersection of these simple forms.
The elementary ‘functions’ (entering, proceeding, ascending, being inside) of the spaces are determinants for the respective design, and for the selection of material, color, or the conception of the lighting. In the interior of the House With Clear Shapes And A Complex Entrance, there are no walls other than those arising from the overlapping of the two volumes. The shape of the exterior translates the shape of the interior, and vice versa.
The furniture is designed and built by Jonas von Ostrowski as freestanding, space-defining, and sculptural units. An exhibition showing these pieces called FFLA (Furniture For Los Angeles) has been touring through Germany, starting in Kunstraum Munich, over Philipp Pflug Contemporary in Frankfurt to their final destination in Los Angeles, Germany. The House With Clear Shapes And A Complex Entrance has been realized in collaboration with the architectural office Studio Nitsche. It has been mostly self-built, and for that purpose, it is designed as simple wood construction.
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Project Team: Philipp Nitsche, Johannes Boscher, Günsterode 2017 – 2020
“Los Angeles” ist ein Projekt des Künstlers Jonas von Ostrowski. Auf dem 3000 m² großen Grundstück am Rande des Dorfes Günsterode unweit von Kassel entsteht in den nächsten Jahren ein bewohnbarer Skulpturengarten. Los Angeles ist Treffpunkt und Arbeits- und Aufenthaltsort für Künstler*innen, Architekt*innen und Theoretiker*innen. Aufenthalte in Los Angeles haben das Ziel der Herstellung von künstlerischen Arbeiten, die ortsspezifisch und ortsgebunden sind. Das erste gebaute Objekt ist das “House with clear shapes and a complex entrance”. Aus dem Entwurf von Jonas von Ostrowski wurde von Studio Nitsche in enger Abstimmung mit dem Künstler ein baubares Gebäude entwickelt. Eine große Herausforderung war es, bei dieser Realisierung die Unverfälschtheit der künstlerischen Arbeit zu garantieren. Die Wahl der Bauweise und der verwendeten Materialien musste zudem den gewünscht hohen Anteil von Eigenarbeit bei der Umsetzung ermöglichen. Besonders großen Wert wurde außerdem auf Kriterien der Nachhaltigkeit gelegt.
