aul Preissner is the founding principal of Qua'Virarch and has over 10 years of experience in the profession of architecture. Before founding Qua'Virarch. Mr. Preissner was a senior designer at Eisenman Architects; leading recent projects including the Arizona Cardinals Stadium (version2), and the 75.000m2 City of Culture campus in Santiago Spain. He has also worked in the offices of Philip Johnson, Skidmore Owings and Merrill and Wood-Zapata. Mr. Preissner currently is writing about architecture as choreography of visual and political effects and teaches studios and seminars at the University of Illinois-Chicago, the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He holds a Bachelor of Science (Arch) from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (1996) and Masters in Architecture from Columbia University (2000). His jobs have been published by the Architectural Record; LA Architect, Los Angeles; Label Magazine, Italy; Prophecy Magazine, New York and Abstract, Columbia University.

TA wishes to introduce Qua' Virarch and some of their most recent proposals to you:

Today's Library not only exists as a longstanding historic institution of knowledge, archival information, and educational foundations, but operates as perhaps the last truly public space. After all, it's FREE. This quality of libraries gives them enormous potential for the education and enrichment of nations. Where the world's last remaining public plazas fall to the enlarging sphere of commercial space, only public libraries remain as a destination without burden and a public space with opportunity.

Paul Preissner is the founding principal of Qua'Virarch and has over 10 years of experience in the profession of architecture. Mr. Preissner currently is writing about architecture as choreography of visual and political effects and teaches studios and seminars at the University of Illinois-Chicago, the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago

Libraries are passive and dumb buildings completely dependent on the education and will of the user to know its existence, its system, and its habits before they can begin to take advantage of its resources. The new JSPL will define the library not as a box full of volumes and volumes of books, but as an educational resource determined to awaken a sullen public.

The library and its contents are transformed from a warehouse of books into a new public social centre where the abundance of media and the strict professionalism of its presentation enable a new educational centre for the entire region. A library which is as magnificent as it is accessible, and as complex as it is simple.

The new JSPL tries to present its collection to people in a new format. Instead of endless rows of dimly lit stacks, this library displays its works in a more playful and inviting format. The ability to browse every stack, and explore every section with the curiosity of a new child gives a competitive advantage to the JSPL in reaching its goal: an educated and intelligent public. The JSPL will change the rules of display. Treating information as a public interest: a complete browsing collection is facilitated by compressible stacks, digital access, and beautifully layered book "galleries".

JALISCO STATE PUBLIC LIBRARY (Competition)
LOCATION: Guadalajara, Mexico
DATES: 2004
PROGRAM: Public Library (45,000 SM)
ARCHITECT: Qua'Virarch: Paul Preissner, Jason Chernak, Matthew Utley
ENGINEERING: Arup: Nancy Hamilton
ACOUSTIC ENG: Shiner + Associates, Inc: Fredric Moritz

 

The typical notion of architectural projects creates a programmatic shell that houses various activities, and relationships on the inside, however the image of the building is still determined by its exterior appearance: its skin. This proposal creates a body, not through its skin, but through its organs. Just as the physical volume of the human body can be deciphered from the complex choreography of its parts (skeleton, vascular system, organs), Le Monstre behaves more like an animal than a package. The ferocity with which this project attacks the site, and engages the visitor begets a new type of formal relationship with architecture; one more akin to emotion. Le Monstre connects through its lack of finite definition and through its expanse of internal composition.

LE MONSTRE (Competition)
LOCATION: Gwanjyu, South Korea
DATES: Competition 2005
PROJECT: Asian Cultural Complex
CLIENT: ACC Gwanjyu
BUDGET: N/A

Portmanteau, the expansion of Pittsburgh's West End Bridge, stems from the same organic spirit that allows language to evolve and form new words through previously unconsidered combinations. Instead of continuing the homogenization of the city through the addition of deftly packaged and manicured designs, Portmanteau swims in the same ferocity that gave Pittsburgh its early reputation. Spiraling near the edge of control, the steel work, which provides the structural framework for the new monster, shows no signs of giving in to boredom. There is no beginning or end to the design; it lives in a moment of passion and emotion. Situated at the confluence of the rivers, Portmanteau unites the two banks of the river, without giving privilege to either side. The path provides a braid of three activities across the river: Pedestrian Bridge, Bicycle Path, periodically spaced Observation Bubbles to allow moments for city and river life reflection.

The two end nodes provide the groundwork for community organization and activity without prescribing what should occur. Cafés, Restaurants, Community Stage, River Landings and Trail entries converge to create a new origin of event within Pittsburgh.

WEST END PEDESTRIAN BRIDGE: PORTMANTEAU (Competition)
LOCATION: Pittsburgh, PA
DATES: Competition 2006
PROJECT: West End Pedestrian Bridge: Portmanteau
CLIENT: City of Pittsburgh
BUDGET: N/A

 

Aguasal is a sensory deprivation tank day spa providing the environment for complete mental and physical separation from the external world. The role of the interior architecture is to facilitate this separation through the provocation of visual experience. Aguasal proposes to achieve this through the insertion of an alien surface within an otherwise inarticulate interior.

Using fiberglass panels produced from a CNC-Milled High Density Foam Mold, the ceiling takes on a fleshy and variable appearance due to subtle variation in positioning, lighting and personal movement.

The cinematic sequencing of Aguasal pushes architecture to perform less as a visual enclosure and more as a choreographer of movement and feelings. One first enters into the otherwise gallery-like storefront to be confronted and comforted by an atmospheric performance of ceiling panels which guide the individual into rooms devoid of presence, and transition the subject into a complete and subconscious state of relaxation, meditation and sensory exploration through the removal of all exterior sensory input. Upon emergence from the sensory deprivation tank post session, the character is again sequenced in reverse through the abstractness of the tank rooms into the alien life form of the storefront ceilings back to the exterior world outside.

AGUASAL
LOCATION: Arlington Heights, Illinois
DATES: March 2005 (completion)
PROJECT: 1500 Square Feet Spa
CLIENT: Aguasal Spa
BUDGET: US$60,000

 

SBR MULTISPORT CULTURE
LOCATION: New York, NY
DATES: February 2005 (completion)
PROJECT: 2400 Square Feet MultiSport Culture / Retail Space
CLIENT: SBR Multisport

 

The site of the building occupies the negotiation between extremes in topography. This allows for the landscape to appear uninterrupted by the project and to appear as though site and building are beautiful confluences of natural forces.

GYEONGGI-DO JEONGOK PREHISTORY MUSEUM
LOCATION: Jeongok, Korea
DATES: April 2006 (2º prize international design competition)
PROJECT: 5.000 m2 prehistory museum
CLIENT: Gyeonggi-do Provincial Government