The architect as a creator of questions and answers.
An architect should not passively wait and seek only answers to questions formulated by others. By the Investor, the community and the other participants in the planning or investment process. An architect has the skills to diagnose a problem, define goals and means, and create an answer. That answer may turn into a solution accepted by all interested parties, or it may become a starting point for discussion. In both cases, the undoubted merit of an architect’s initiative is that it starts a process of change that has a chance of bringing positive effects. Such action is nothing new and is widely practised in countries such as the Netherlands and Belgium. As a pro-bono activity, it is regarded as a positive phenomenon and is valued.
The activity described above can be illustrated by the proposal for the development of Piłsudski Square in Warsaw, prepared by FAAB in collaboration with Science Now. The need to prepare our own proposal arose from a disagreement with the ideas being pushed in this respect, in particular by those then in power. For an architect working today, the drive to reconstruct a historic building is hard to understand. That is, one which, in terms of aesthetics and of climate-protection goals, is out of date. Another, no less important issue, was the decision-makers’ aim to locate mainly government offices in the reconstructed buildings. These, by their nature, are barely accessible to citizens and largely serve to secure the needs of those in power. Such an approach, where one of the most attractive sites in the country’s capital is allocated to the seat of the authorities, seems to contradict the spirit of the idea of civil society. In FAAB’s view, the most valuable sites should be allocated to public services, accessible to the widest possible audience. Another equally important reason was the progressive degradation of the square’s space.
This once open space, used for gatherings, was gradually and in a poorly coordinated way enriched with successive monuments and symbols. The square’s original function was becoming blurred, and this in turn should be a starting point for a discussion about a thorough transformation of the space, including a change of its function.
As part of the design proposal, FAAB envisaged a Media Library open 24 hours a day and a Digital Reality Exploratorium, under the patronage of leading Polish IT companies and scientific institutions. An extension of the National Gallery of Art, Zachęta, was foreseen through the construction of a New Zachęta. A section of Królewska Street, closed to car traffic, would be transformed into an Art Square, used for outdoor exhibitions and performance-art events. The programme would be complemented by a Museum of Cryptology and a Centre for Mathematics, along with a Museum of the Piłsudski Square Space, which would serve as a refuge for the monuments relocated to it from the square. The investment also planned the creation of the largest bicycle car park in Europe and the transformation of most of the square’s current slab into Piłsudski Park. Provision was made for managing all rainwater, including from the surrounding streets and squares, and for generating electricity through panels built into the facade and pavements that convert footsteps into current. A City Health Resort was planned, where specially selected plants would create a microclimate with air free of nitrogen oxides and PM particles.
An activity of a similar character is the Pawiak Prison Museum. This time, however, the project is at the same time a polemic with the position of the conservation services, which formulated an idea for the development of the space based on the “symbolism of emptiness”. Such an idea rules out any intervention in the existing arrangement, built shortly after the Second World War. As FAAB’s research showed, the original, more ambitious design was reduced to a minimum owing to a lack of funds. This currently functioning form does not allow the institution to develop. It reflects only to a small degree the pre-war prison complex, which no longer exists today. Nor does it meet the expectations of the still-living prisoners of Pawiak. It is hard not to get the impression that the “idea of emptiness” does not work on any level and preserves a form that is now substandard both aesthetically and functionally.
Seeking an answer to the question of what the Pawiak Prison Museum should be, FAAB reached significantly beyond the land belonging to the direct Investor. It was assumed that the museum building, together with its immediate surroundings, should be devoted exclusively to exhibition purposes connected with the history of the place. In order to convey the historic scale of the complex, a vertical park was proposed on the site of the former women’s prison building, the so-called Serbia (part of the present-day General Jan Jur-Gorzechowski Square). This park, of a size close to the building that no longer exists today, is intended to be a place of rest for local residents. It has been prepared in such a way that it can also serve as a stage for cultural events and various kinds of animation. Joining the two sites, that is, the Pawiak Prison Museum and the vertical park, into a single area free of car traffic is an idea reserved for realisation in the future. What is proposed for realisation together with the extension of the Pawiak Prison Museum, however, is a change of the surface of a section of Jana Pawła Avenue, over the area of the former prison grounds. In this way the actual scale of the pre-war complex would be conveyed. Calming the car traffic might perhaps prompt reflection in people travelling through this part of the city.
