Test Site: An exhibition for the Project "Social Condenser Extraordinaire: The Municipal Services Buildings of Hong Kong"HKU Department of Architecture
This sample exhibition, showcasing what are today known as the Municipal Services Building (MSB), a much-overlooked publicly-owned architectural type unique to Hong Kong's density and institutional history and today facing demolition and renewal, will serve as the basis and an opportunity to "test" the display modes and communication forms of the exhibition contents, for inclusion in a forthcoming venue of an international platform. The contents for exhibition will include analytical measured architectural drawings and physical models of differing scales, as well as photographic documentations, archival documents from the Public Works Department (today the Architectural Services Department) and Public Records Office, and additional ephemera, focused around a selection of these vertically-stacked, multi-functional civic buildings, built as Urban Council complexes (in Chinese市政大廈) by the since-1999-dissolved body of the Urban Council [市政局]. Ongoing scientific measurements taken of the tropical modernist buildings, designed with natural ventilation and today starting to be sealed in the envelope, will also be included to highlight the openness aspired to and the ideals for public amenities manifested in the original designs of this building type. For this particular site at PMQ, the design of a flexible system of exhibition structures that could be transportable and also highlight the archival aspect of the urgent documentation of this eroding type will be tested in how to present the ongoing research. We will also be using the setting of the exhibition for workshops and exchanges that will evolve the project.