Open Studios, Spring 2021
Drawing for Foxes & Cross Country Skiers
Jennifer O’Donnell & Jonathan Janssens
Jennifer O’Donnell undertakes a period of extended focus into the development of her drawings as a fundamental part of her creative practice. In particular, she investigates the medium of survey drawing with the aim of developing new applications and interpretations of this measured, familiar mechanism for interpreting the world around us. In response to the special situation of an artist residency in Lockdown and in acknowledgment of what would have been the 100th birthday of the architect Werner Düttmann, who designed their temporary home, she decided together with the architect Jonathan Janssens to draw the spaces of the atelier, as well as their lives within it. In support of the practice of open studios, even in corona-times, they project the finished axonometric survey drawing onto the studio window, creating a 3m x 3m glowing box within which the drawing, now animated, draws and undraws itself, the active drawing signalling the act of drawing going on within.
For the digital Open Studios by the JUNGE AKADEMIE, fellows Philipp Valente (Architecture), Nida Mehboob (Film and Media Arts) and Jennifer O’Donnell with Jonathan Janssens (Architecture) present current works-in-progress and topics such as book projects and installations they have worked on at the Akademie der Künste spaces in the Hansaviertel this spring 2021.
Video by Elisabeth Börnicke & Julia Milz
lives in Berlin
Jennifer O’Donnell is an Irish architect and co-founder of plattenbaustudio. She studied architecture at University College Dublin and KTH Stockholm, graduating with first class honours. Her work focuses on the inhabitation of architecture, using architectural drawing as a means of studying and comprehending the complexities of the built environment. Her interest lies in the everyday realities of architecture in use; in the appropriation of space by the body and by objects. Her ongoing interest in architectural drawing includes its potential as a tool for communication within the wider public discourse around architecture. Jennifer’s work has been exhibited at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, the London Festival of Design and the Irish Embassy in Berlin.
More about Jennifer O’Donnell