Anya Sirota+AKOAKI Exhibit Piranesian Bling from Detroit’s Iconic Packard Plant

OPENING RECEPTION

Friday, August 10, 2012 6PM – 8PM

EXHIBITION OPEN EXCLUSIVELY Saturday, August 11, 2012 and by appointment thru August 30th

Soloway Gallery is pleased to present MY LOVE FOR YOU BURNS ALL THE TIME an exhibition of silver fragments of ruination from Detroit’s iconic Packard Plant. The work by Anya Sirota + AKOAKI assembles together a series of replicas depicting sublime architectural obsolescence. The resultant survey abstracts and reveals the notorious post-industrial behemoth’s chimerical appeal.

The constellation of derelict miniatures produced for MY LOVE FOR YOU BURNS ALL THE TIME suggests that the Packard Plant’s stature and industrial uselessness secures its self-referential monumentality. At a precarious moment in the building’s history, as buzz about imminent demolition continues to grow, the work is a commentary on contemporary fascination with representations of decay and the value of neglected sites in the collective optic.

Included in the exhibition, alongside handsome reproductions of cropped remains, AKOAKI has constructed a three dimensional sectional model from Albert Kahn’s original drawings. Also shown are a video and a fully-illustrated catalogue.

Free and open to the public

About Anya Sirota + AKOAKI

Anya Sirota is an Assistant Professor of Architecture at Taubman College of Architecture + Urban Planning, and a cofounder of AKOAKI. Sirota received her masters of architecture from Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, where she earned the Araldo Cossutta Prize for Design Excellence. She holds a B.A. in modern culture and media from Brown University. Her installation work explores the appropriation of neglected sites for public function.

AKOAKI is a research and design practice. We explore tactical spatial interventions, architectural salvage, and emergent urban typologies The interdisciplinary focus of the work treats architecture as a socially embedded network, liberally appropriating techniques from scenography, landscape architecture, documentary practice and media installation. While the scope and scale of our projects shifts and adjusts to meet the specific parameters of each individual scenario, the unifying concern is the production of civic, non-restrictive environments.

Additional information available at www.akoaki.com

MY LOVE FOR YOU BURNS ALL THE TIME is supported with funding from Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning