Begin Again. Fail Better: Preliminary Drawings in Art and Architecture

1 June – 25 August 2024, Kunstmuseum, Olten; 5 November – 2 December 2024, Archizoom, EPFL

Curated by Manuel Montenegro, Helen Thomas and Marco Bakker

Begin Again. Fail Better installed at the Kunstmuseum, Olten. Photo: Kaspar Ruoff.

‘Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better…’.

This exhibition highlights the early drawings and sketches that give birth to an idea, whether they relate to a real project or are simply free exploration, aesthetic study, or utopian dream. Taking its title from a famous quote by Samuel Beckett, the exhibition shows drawing as part of the design process: architects try, fail, try again, fail again, until they begin to move in the direction that will eventually become a building — or not.

The exhibition presents a selection of 160 historical works by Swiss and European architects from the archival collections of Drawing Matter, ETH Zurich, EPFL Lausanne and USI-Mendrisio Academy of Architecture. These are combined with drawings from 50 contemporary Swiss architecture offices, each of which were invited to exhibit two drawings from their current practice, revealing something about their individual approach and understanding of architecture.

A catalogue accompanies the exhibition and includes texts by the curators, participating offices and Drawing Matter’s own Niall Hobhouse and Matt Page.

A lightbox of the material loaned to the exhibition from the Drawing Matter Collection can be viewed here (requires registration/logging-in to the catalogue).