SOS BRUTALISM – Save the Concrete Monsters!

The DAM is presenting the first-ever global survey of the Brutalist architecture of the 1950s to 1970s. The term Brutalism does not originate from the word “brutal”, but rather béton brut—the French term for exposed concrete. Brutalist architecture celebrates rawness and the bare construction. It is exceptionally photogenic and, in recent years, it has reached cult status on Facebook and Instagram. That said, many people still only see these buildings as ugly concrete monsters. The expressive style emerged during a period of experimentation and societal upheaval. Today many are at risk of being demolished. In light of this, the #SOSBrutalism campaign extends the exhibition online with a database of over 1,000 projects. Media partners are the BauNetz and uncube magazine.

At the DAM, Brutalism is reexamined with unusually large-scale models and cast concrete miniatures that were built by the Kaiserslautern Technical University for SOS Brutalism. The exhibition features buildings from Japan, Brazil, the former Yugoslavia and Israel, as well as Great Britain, where Alison and Peter Smithson invented New Brutalism.

The exhibition is accompanied by another activity on social media: The visitors are encouraged to mark photos of Brutalist buildings in Frankfurt with the hashtags #Betonperle and #FFM: the best findings will be included in the exhibition.

ONLINE CAMPAIGN: www.SOSBrutalism.org

Exhibition curator of "SOS Brutalism" is OLIVER ELSER.

Deutsches Architekturmuseum