Team 10 as Contact Zone:
On the Transculturation of Modern Architectural Ideas
by Tom Avermaete
In the past decades Team 10 has been investigated from a variety of angles, being alternatively casted as a ‘family’, a ‘group’ or even a ‘paradigm’. In this lecture we propose to understand the importance of Team 10 through its function as ‘contact zone’ within the broader horizon of post-war architectural culture. Such a contact zone is a space where people meet with one another, but also — and more importantly — a locus in which diverse ideas, concepts and approaches encounter and grapple with one another. For architecture culture the importance of such as ‘contact zone’ resides in the fact that viewpoints and perspectives that previously belonged to different communities of practice, to various architectural cultures, or to distinct theoretical geographies, are confronted and transculturated. This lecture will illuminate several transculturations that took place within the context of Team 10 and explore how the contact zone represents a modus operandi that allows for a shared approach to theory and praxis, without becoming a dogma.
Tom Avermaete is professor for the History and Theory of Urban Design at the for the History and Theory of Urban Design (gta) of ETH Zürich.
