positionen - 20.05.2026
What if cities are not designed, but co-written layer by layer? What if architectural thinking begins with a dialogue instead of a drawing? With these questions, Riccarda Cappeller has engaged in her artistic and research-based work on the concept and practice of Cooperative Architecture, tracing how architecture can emerge through relational processes: through co-creation, co-habitation, and collective authorship. It reimagines the city not through imposition, but through attention. Cooperative Architecture discusses three urban situations in transformation: Granby Four Streets in Liverpool, Can Batlló in Barcelona and ExRotaprint in Berlin. Each site is a living laboratory, a field of improvisation, testing practices of repair and care. Together they demonstrate that architecture is not a fixed object, but a performative and transformative cooperative act.
In her book, Riccarda Cappeller shows how artistic strategies and design-based thinking, driven by an ethnographical methodology – from situated writing, visual mapping, and documentary filmmaking – can develop exemplary ways to conduct architectural design research to curate urban situations. Cooperative Architecture highlights the invisible grounds of space, from social traces and relations to urban processes of transformation and shared rhythms.
The event, part of the positionen lecture series, will take place on Wednesday at 7:15 p.m. in Lecture Hall Ni 001, Nieper Building, HTWK Leipzig, Karl-Liebknecht-Straße 134.
Vorab um 18 Uhr:
Vernissage des BDA Studienpreis Konrad Wachsmann im Foyer HTWK Bibliothek. Die Ausstellung Studienpreis Konrad Wachsmann des Bund Deutscher Architektinnen und Architekten BDA ist vom 20. Mai bis 10. Juni 2026, im Foyer der HTWK Bibliothek, Gustav-Freytag-Straße 40 zu sehen.
Website: invisiblegrounds.com
Die bestätigten Vortragsbesuche werden als Fortbildungsnachweis von der Architektenkammer Sachsen anerkannt.
Mit freundlicher Unterstützung durch / in Kooperation mit:
Bund Deutscher Architektinnen und Architekten BDA
Architektenkammer Sachsen
Stadt Leipzig, Dezernat Stadtentwicklung und Bau
Stadt Leipzig, Referat Internationale Zusammenarbeit
Kulturstiftung Leipzig und Förderverein HTWK Leipzig
positionen zu Architektur, Kultur, Stadt und Gesellschaft
Fakultät Architektur und Sozialwissenschaften, HTWK Leipzig,
Konzeption: Annette Menting
