Jaap Bakema Study Centre
Collaboration with Het Nieuwe Instituut, Rotterdam
The Jaap Bakema Study Centre started life in 2013 as collaboration between Het Nieuwe Instituut and TU Delft’s faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment. The goal was to instigate academic research, together with third parties, in the fields of architecture and urban planning. Partners per sub-project include: Gulbenkian Museum (Lisbon), The Berlage, Archive institutes (Smithson family archive, Aldo and Hannie van Eyck Foundation, BroekBakema, etc).

The centre explicitly aims to open up the materials in the State Archive. The collections of the National Archive for Dutch Architecture and Planning form the basis for formulating a research programme which is situated at the intersection of advanced historical/theoretical studies and urgent social issues. The activities are distributed among several long-term projects.
The Jaap Bakema Study Centre has an academic advisory board consisting of Tom Avermaete (ETH Zürich), Hetty Berens (HNI), Maristella Casciato (Getty Institute), Carola Hein (TU Delft) and Laurent Stalder (ETH Zürich).
Each year, the Jaap Bakema Study Centre organizes an international conference on topics related to its research. Previous editions dealt with themes such as the open society, the relationship between research and exhibition practices, architectural drawing in the digital age, the architect’s tools and the legacy of Aldo and Hannie van Eyck.
As of 2018, the research group Architecture, Culture and Modernity has been established at TU Delft by Dirk van den Heuvel and Jorge Mejia Hernandez. Special emphasis is reserved for the academic value of the archives at Het Nieuwe Instituut. A first call for PhD proposals and PhD colloquium was set up related to the theme ‘Architecture and Democracy’.
The Jaap Bakema Study Centre also facilitates visiting researchers who help to disclose the archive of Het Nieuwe Instituut. Previous guests include: M. Christine Boyer (Princeton University), Georges Teyssot (Université de Laval), Gianluca Ferriero (Politecnico di Milano), Rebeca Merino del Río (Universidad de Valladolid), and Fabiano Borba Vianna (Universidade de São Paulo), among others. In 2017, the Jaap Bakema Study Centre welcomed Maarten Gielen and Lionel Devlieger of the Brussels-based office Rotor as visiting professors.
Facts
Funder: | Het Nieuwe Instituut (HNI) |
Overall budget: | ca. € 100.000,- per annum |
Grant amount: | Structural collaboration with additional funding per sub-project. Contribution to TU Delft: per sub-project (e.g. book, conference), overall for 2016-2018 ca. € 200.00,- incl fte |
Role TU Delft: | Lead partner |
Project duration: | Established as of November 2013. Current cycle 2017 - 2020 |
TU Delft researchers: | Dr.ir. Dirk van den Heuvel Dr. Jorge Mejia Dr. Cathelijne Nuijsink Dr. Leonardo Zuccaro Marchi Fatma Tanis Dorina Pllumbi Golnar Abbasi Jana Culek Federica Marulo |
Project partners
Het Nieuwe Instituut (HNI)