Architcture of Cybernetics of Organization

The research project "Architecture of Cybernetics of Organization" (ACO) proposes the first comprehensive and systematic documentation of the "architectural" works of German management consultants Wolfgang and Eberhard Schnelle and its trans-disciplinary team from the late 1950s until mid 1970s. It explores the very unique non- architects design-practice (1) by registering its specific design-method "cybernetics of organization", (2) by addressing its engagement with the cybernetic discourse in running a publishing house and (3) by analysing its invention - the "Bürolandschaften" [office-landscapes]. In doing so, the project engages with the research-subject in a threefold way: (1) It traces the concrete influences and consequences of the non-architects spatial practice on the production of architecture and the built environment. (2) It pursues the significance of a cybernetically induced managerial world-conception for a contemporary pre- dominant understanding and discoursive construction of space. (3) It thus follows the spatial and organizational prerequisites for todays way of "living together" and offers - through its documentation, analysis and reflection - openings towards a field of spatial and cultural practices. The outcome of the research will be published on an open-access Website (www.rumpfhuber.org) as a catalogue and as a series of articles in order to allow constant evaluation and communication with the research community. A book and an exhibition will form the final result, allowing a precise and confined presentation of the research.

The research project Architecture of Cybernetics of Organization compiled the first comprehensive and systematic documentation of the architectural work of German management consulters Wolfgang and Eberhard Schnelle and their so-called Quickborner Team. In the late 1950s the Quickborner Team developed a completely new office type generally known as Bürolandschaft [office landscape] through the application of a cybernetic inspired design method they called Organisationskybernetik [cybernetics of organization]. The assumption was to generate a new organization of spaces of administrative work in Post-War Germany that would be freed of traditional hierarchic structures. Its result was the Bürolandschaft: soccer-field big, chaotic looking office interiors, only structured through its furniture, plants and mobile walls. The practice of Quickborner team did not limit itself to the organization of offices, but embraced a new and democratic organization of design processes, of public architecture and the city at large. It must be understood as a precursor of two today seemingly opposite positions in architecture: (1) through the cybernetic inspired design method and the consequent quantification of all work-processes in order to make it calculable and programmable for the automats at that time, it needs to be read as a precursor for parametric design. (2) On the other hand the consequent participatory approach needs to be accounted for being a precursor for contemporary methods of participation. Despite of the methods and the Bürolandschafts national and international huge success and in spite of the intensive publication activity within and outside of the Architecture discourse, was the practice of Quickborner Team not recognized and certainly not documented. The project compiled a comprehensive archive of the practice of Quickborner Team. It encompasses around 2500 digitized slides, various work-materials and instruments, as well as a complete list of all the publications of Quickborner Team. The most significant examples (projects, books, magazines) as well as parts of the reflection on the material will be made publicly available on the website www.buerolandschaft.net. An exhibition project and a monograph of the early practice of Quickborner Team is in the making.