Suburbia
Living the American Dream
Suburbia traces the history of an ideal life-style that – starting in the US suburbs – conquered the world and…
Location: Architekturzentrum Wien - Exhibition hall 2
Lecture & Response
Built Role Models
To accompany the exhibition 'Suburbia'
Wed 11.06.2025, 18:00-20:00
Weronika Gęsicka: Untitled #52 (from the Traces series, 2015–2017).
For her Traces series, the Polish artist Weronika Gęsicka searched various online image databases for photos from the 1940s to the 1960s that reflect the American way of life of that time and manipulated the depicted idyll in an intuitive and playful manner.
© Photograph: Weronika Gęsicka and Galerie Jednostka, Warsaw
The architect Jan Engelke describes the detached house as a "sexist form of housing". The lecture and response shed light on the housing and role models behind the dream of having a house, and how these fit in with the diversity of social concepts in the 21st century.
Dad, Mum and a child happily united in their own house — that is the dream of millions of people. This is actually a very recent dream, which triggered the construction boom of new houses in Austria after 1945. This was no coincidence, but was driven by political and economic interests that were to become deeply embedded in the private sphere. To this day, the floor plans of these houses, which have hardly changed for decades, manifest heteronormative role models while hampering new housing and family models. An evening spent discussing housing images, knowledge and ideologies that characterise architecture, and so society.
Lecture: Jan Engelke, academic assistant, Urban Design, TU München
Response: Bernadette Krejs, Senior Scientist, Housing Construction and Design, TU Wien
