Jonathan Houser is Head of Finder Sted / Taking Place – the Bachelor’s program at the Institute of Architecture and Culture at the Royal Danish Academy.
Over the past 10 years, Jonathan has been deeply engaged with the artistic and poetic potential of absolute sustainability and humanity’s coexistence with other species. In this context, the following projects are particularly noteworthy: the realized project The Moth House (Natsværmerhuset), the second prize proposal for storm surge protection in Vejle – While We Wait for the Water (Mens Vi Venter på Vandet), and the ongoing artistic development project Infinity City, which also includes the manifesto Towards an Oceanic Architecture (Mod en oceanisk arkitektur).
Jonathan has thus worked extensively with exhibitions, including exhibiting his own works, such as The Search, which was shown at Louisiana Museum’s exhibition The Moon (Månen), as well as with written dissemination through his own practice and through his position at the Royal Danish Academy.
Through the project Miniatura, a hybrid museum built at a 1:10 scale, whose exhibitions were presented online from 2021–2023, Jonathan has worked with curation and focus on emerging artists, including collaboration with Spacegirls.
His work with museum architecture has also influenced his assignments as an architect at Lundgaard & Tranberg, where Jonathan was responsible for the winning proposal for the Museum of Danish Resistance (Frihedsmuseet) and was part of the studio’s design team for the Natural History Museum of Denmark (Statens Naturhistoriske Museum).
JONATHAN HOUSER
Biography >
1st price in open competition, Exhibited at Kunstakademien, Stockholm, Sweden, 2014,
Collaborator: Mikael Stenström
Billeder, tegn og symboler, der fylder byens rum, påvirker vores mentale og fysiske eksistens. Derfor er det stærkeste greb måske at fjerne noget i stedet for at tilføre endnu en stemme til kakofonien?
Den grundlæggende idé ved dette projekt baserer sig på den holdning, og foreslår derfor at tømme den travleste handelsgade i Stockholm, Drottninggatan, for herved at frigøre et tomrum for tanker og associationer. Et nyt rum opstår i kontrast til det omkringliggende miljø og byens informationsoverflod. I forskydningen mellem det fyldte, det tomme og det forladte udpeger forslaget den konstante kamp mellem plads og opmærksomhed i det offentlige rum. Gadens og butikkernes indhold er symbolsk flyttet til galleriet og herved transformeret til kunst, der diskuterer forholdet mellem det private og det kollektive i byens rum.