Groundwork

Film for architecture: the possibility of a double transformation

“The Museum Is Not Enough”: this is the title of a book publication (2019) by the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA), Montreal, and a thread of its research activity. The focus is on architecture as curatorial practice rather than as building construction. More precisely, the CCA is now known for its work with the medium of film, and this not in a general sense, but specifically in the context of architecture exhibitions. As the Schweizerisches Architekturmuseum (S_AM) Basel invites Irene Chin and Francesco Garutti to curate an exhibition that shows three of their film productions – in collaboration with the filmmaker Joshua Frank – the Basel exhibition becomes an exhibition on exhibitions or, better, on how film can be an integral part of an architecture exhibition among other objects: models, illustrations, artifacts, photographs.

In her intervention at the beginning of the Basel exhibition (9 May 2026), Irene Chin explains that objects are not enough, and that film can help us dive into the process behind an architectural project. Such a process is the true interest of the CCA, not just as a useful complement in understanding architecture as a product. At stake is a change of mentality about architecture, where attention to process prevails over any orientation towards its products.

Even if it could also be interesting to discover the process behind product-oriented architecture projects, the three films screened at the S_AM actually focus on architecture projects that are themselves not product-oriented. The narrativity of films, thus, seems to be the perfect tool for unravelling such reflections on process, that is, on the structural conditions of practicing architecture. In her project on Meizhou Island (China), the architect Xu Tiantian places the accent on the “pressure points” that would help the ecological balance of the island’s fish farming to recover: “acupuncture architecture” is a process oriented towards repair and care. With the HouseEurope! project, initiated by Arno Brandlhuber’s B+ Studio in Berlin, we follow the process of putting several urban and architectural players in dialogue, a public dialogue that, through holistic thinking and communal responsibility, aims to let the concept of renovation politically overcome that of “demolish & rebuild”. In Minas Gerais, the meeting between the architect Carla Juaçaba and the coffee entrepreneur Milena Rodrigues will shape a development project on a coffee field, where ideas such as “choreography of materials” and “temporary occupation” allow us to rethink the territory through an environmental education centre, thereby supporting local activism for biodiversity against extractivist monocultures (Flor de café).

The films work retrospectively on these processes; they follow already existing processes. Is this a limit to the use of the medium of film? We should find their proactive, performative character in their capacity to enhance a transformation in our perception of the fundamental tasks of architecture. In this regard, Irene Chin is quite vocal in calling for a change of the “system of values” concerning architectural practice. But how exactly can these films achieve such a goal?

The answer shows both the strength and the weakness of this particular use of the medium of film in the architectural process by the CCA. The documentary, fact-centred, informative style of the films lets them work mainly on the level of knowledge. The performative core of the films concerns our understanding and capacity for reflection about fundamental questions of architecture, for which the “case studies” serve only as examples. Joshua Frank’s camera still tries something more than showing facts and delivering information: sometimes close-ups stress the materiality of the processes, conveying a sense of immersion. But such artistic licences are not able to build a proper cinematic discourse, insofar as they are strictly framed within a hierarchical structure in which knowledge matters – as Irene Chin herself admits in the discussion with the S_AM curator Yuma Shinohara. With these films, we learn a lot – this is their strength – and will probably open ourselves to an intellectual transformation. The weakness is that this use of the medium of film is very limited and does not exploit the experiential power of watching a film.

What if film were used in architecture not only as a tool of representation but as a field of experience? What if we concentrated on the question “what is the film doing to me?” instead of “what is the film about?” It seems to me that there is an enormous potential for architecture here – not only in the moment of its exhibition but also in the moment of its own making (two moments that could finally conflate). As for the idea of renovation instead of “demolish & rebuild”, for example, a touching story about mending relationships could be very effective; a film on the virtues of multicultural cohabitation could be particularly successful in speaking about biodiversity, and so on.

In approaching film as a field of experience, film can also help shape the feeling of the space, not only through what the film shows but through its interaction with the exhibition space, as in expanded cinema experiences. In her discourse, Irene Chin highlighted the importance of the interaction between films and objects in the exhibition. It is probably at this level, that of the dramaturgy of the exhibition installation, that we can find traces of such an approach to film as a field of experience. From this perspective, it is a bit astonishing that the Basel exhibition neatly separates the space for the objects from the space for the films. A cross-media exercise, moreover, would naturally bring a critical distance, thus balancing the structural difficulty of gaining distance from one’s own subject when one produces a documentary film.

If the activity of the CCA with the medium of film can help us operate a first transformation of mentality towards architecture – from product to process orientation – a further transformation of approach in the use of the medium of film would introduce the effectiveness of experience as a further level that would complete the intellectual dimension of this orientation towards process.