Until 10 April 2026, you can discover the artistic work of no fewer than ten Belgian architects at the Works + Words Biennale in Aarhus (Denmark). Their experimental, artistic contributions challenge, broaden and renew the discipline of architecture and encourage new ways of thinking and acting in architecture.
The Works + Words Biennale, which was first organised in 2017 at the Copenhagen School of Architecture and is now in its fourth edition in Aarhus, showcases this broad, continuous spectrum of artistic research in architecture, ranging from experimental art forms to actual built projects. The work of no fewer than ten Belgian designers was selected by a panel of experts to be presented at the exhibition and the symposium. Eight of them are affiliated with the Faculty of Architecture at KU Leuven (Ghent and Brussels).
One example is the work ‘Glitch Me Softly’ by Manou Van den Eynde. Using a cyborg avatar model, she investigates how the human body is often stereotypically depicted in digital architectural drawings. Through glitching and hacking, she seeks ways to break through that perfect, normative visual culture. In ‘In Space We Read Trauma’, Gjiltinë Isufi analyses how the heavily laden yet architecturally undocumented prison of Gjilan (Kosovo) can nevertheless be reconstructed and understood. Using alternative forms of evidence, such as interviews, drawings and sounds, she attempts to gain insight into the conditions in which political prisoners lived there between 1980 and 1999. ‘A wind line’ by Mira Sanders and Cedric Noël, on the other hand, is an installation featuring film, voice and textiles, in which the wind plays the leading role in an industrial coastal town in the northern Netherlands. The work demonstrates, in a vulnerable manner, how ecological, political and material interests are inextricably linked in the landscape shaped by energy infrastructures.
The artistic research in architecture on display at the biennial does not primarily focus on formulating practical and measurable solutions, but rather serves as a means of reframing worldly, spatial problems, opening up new perspectives and thereby questioning the discipline of architecture. The work embodies a fundamentally qualitative, non-quantifiable value, and is therefore significant in its own right for the future of architecture.
The book ‘Works + Words – Artistic Research in Architecture’ is due to be published shortly, documenting and reviewing the work from the previous biennials of 2017, 2019 and 2022 in Copenhagen. It is written by Peter Bertram and Martin Søberg.
There is also the publication ‘In the Making: Artistic Methods as New Paths to Change’, published by the Royal Danish Academy (2025). This book explores how architects think and work during the design process, and, through twelve articles, demonstrates how their experimental, multidisciplinary methods help to understand and address complex societal issues.
05.03.2026 – 10.04.2026
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