Presentation of the programme of activities 2020

This 2020 the Mies van der Rohe Pavilion is activated more than ever as a public platform to dissolve the boundaries between architectural research and the arts, promoting the dissemination of architecture in collaboration with an extensive and varied network of entities and People.

The 2020 program brings together and generates synergies between academia, artistic production and the architectural culture of cities and territories.

It also gets closer than ever to the general public incorporating as a highlight the first 12 Sundays of the month as open days that add to those already established and proposes to reach the 100,000 visitors annually. 

Artistic interventions in the Pavilion
The program of interventions in the Pavilion acts as a way to maintain active interpretations of the Pavilion, this year it presents the proposals by Mario Pasqualotto (Festival Llum Barcelona), Katarzyna Karkowiak (Sónar Mies) and Laercio Redondo (Barcelona Gallery Weekend).

The 2020 program highlights the actions and performances resulting from academic collaborations and architectural research: Beatiful Failures with Stella Rahola and Roger Paez (Elisava), P!DF by Prem Krishnamurthy (EINA)and two more collaborations, one with Luke Olsen and MIAS Architects (Barlett School) and the other with Ciro Najle, Anna Font and Josep Ferrando (Universitat Torcuato di Tella). Finally, Re-enactment: the work of Lilly Reich occupies the Barcelona Pavilion, by Laura Martínez de Guereñu, will present the results of the first edition of the Lilly Reich Grant for Equality in Architecture.

This year we will also present the publications of two of the interventions: the catalogue of Sabine Marcelis and the book "Expression of Weight" by Luis Martínez Santa-María that follow and enrich the speech they proposed with "No fear of Glass" and "I do not want to change the world. I only want to express it" respectively.

Educational activity

The educational action plan is expanded with a new activity aimed at primary school students, which is added to those we already offer to secondary and high school students and activities aimed at family audiences are reinforced.
The second edition of the Lilly ‘Reich Grant for Equality in Architecture’ will be called and we will continue the collaboration with local platforms such as the Consell d’Innovació Pedagògica. 

Exhibitions
The dissemination of the collection of the archive of the Fundació, the EU Mies Award and the YTAA through our exhibitions that act as a platform for dissemination and debate in its travelling around Europe and beyond.

In 2020 in addition to the exhibition “Architectures on the Waterfront” that has been presented at the Museu Marítim in Barcelona, we present the exhibition “Architecture is of Public Interest” in Moscow and we talk about social housing in the exhibition of the Cité de l'architecture et du patrimoine in Paris and in the proposal “Never demolish” that Ruby Press brings to the Pavilion. The travelling exhibition of the EU Mies Award will find new venues in Leuven and Vienna. The third edition of the YTAA -Young Talent Award will select the best graduation projects and present them in the context of the Venice Biennale. 

Visits and activities in the Pavilion

We add to the open days already consolidated the first Sundays of the month and offer an annual pass with a very reduced cost that allows unlimited access to the Pavilion so that those of us who have it nearby can enjoy and show it whenever we want and no one is excluded. In the Pavilion in addition to the interventions, the 2020 programme brings the screen film series Pantalla Pavelló, the concerts of Pavelló de Músic a and the proposal of Pavelló de Lectura.

Taking advantage of the exceptionality of the pavilion space to perform music we present three concerts in collaboration with the Fundación Goethe and Barcelona Obertura. And when the good weather arrives the programme Pantalla Pavelló, in which the films are beamed directly on the travertine, under the title "Mies in America", will take us on this occasion four films that will bring us closer to the historical moment that he lived.

The interest generated by the Pavilion itself and its activities is evident in the public that participates in its activities and follows them in the web. In 2019, 95,000 people visited the Pavilion, including 465 school groups; and our exhibitions here and abroad had 60,000 visitors. The Fundació organised 87 activities: 56 in Barcelona, of which 40 took place in the Pavilion and more than 20 exhibitions in Europe and in the USA in addition to other activities in collaboration with other entities.