“Architecture concerns us all”

She intervened with friendly determination and took a clear stance—not always to everyone's delight. But it was precisely her trenchant positions that made discourse possible and that placed architecture and urban culture in a wider social context. Kristin Feireiss-Commerell was a journalist, critic and exhibition organizer—and, together with Helga Retzer († 1984), she founded Aedes – Galerie für Architektur und Raum in Berlin-Charlottenburg in 1980.

Her perspective from outside the architectural circle always focused on communicating professional topics to the general public, a concern that she placed at the center of her work. Over the course of 45 years, Aedes developed into a platform for discourse on Berlin, German, and global architectural issues. It was part of her self-image to promote women—provided she was convinced of the quality of their work. Kristin passed away last weekend after a short, serious illness at the age of 82.

In their first exhibition, the gallery owners presented the Berlin design by Alison and Peter Smithson from 1957—a clear statement in the postmodern fever of the IBA 87, where the question of style was hotly debated, especially in the new building section. The second exhibition, In Memoriam Kongresshalle Berlin, was dedicated to the recently collapsed hall by Hugh Stubbins, which was built for Interbau in 1957. Architects and artists from all over the world submitted new ideas and comments for the show. This resulted in the first of the characteristic square catalogs—over 450 have since been published.

Since its opening, the gallery has shown more than 600 exhibitions—some monographic, some thematically curated. Accompanied by events, they created visibility for architectural and urban practice. In 1988, the gallery moved into the S-Bahn arches at Savignyplatz. One year later, the Berlin Wall came down, and in 1994 Kristin and her partner Hans-Jürgen Commerell opened Aedes East in the Hackesche Höfe. The move to the current location on Pfefferberg followed in 2006, then renamed Aedes Architekturforum (Aedes Architecture Forum).

Kristin's tireless commitment to architectural culture was recognized many times internationally and she was honored with important awards. At the same time, Kristin herself was active on numerous juries—both for architectural competitions and prestigious architecture awards. From 2013 to 2017, for example, she was a member of the jury for the Pritzker Architecture Prize. Many architects who exhibited at Aedes later received this prize: Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid, Rem Koolhaas, Álvaro Siza, Thom Mayne, SANAA, Wang Shu, and Liu Jiakun. Some, such as Koolhaas and Hadid, were largely unknown at their first Aedes exhibitions. Wang Shu and Liu Jiakun were also only known to a small specialist audience outside of China before they were presented at Aedes. With a keen sense of quality and zeitgeist, Kristin knew how to promote young and undiscovered talents right from the start. This remained her principle throughout the years: she was always open, approachable—and gave young people confidence.

Kristin published and edited numerous books and, in addition to her work for Aedes, was involved in many other architecture exhibitions, including for the Hamburger Kunsthalle, the Deutsches Architekturmuseum (DAM) in Frankfurt, and the Centre Pompidou in Paris. When Berlin was European Capital of Culture in 1988, she curated the exhibition Berlin – Denkmal oder Denkmodell
(Berlin – Monument, or model for thought?), which was later also shown at other venues. Its success led Jacques Chirac, mayor of Paris at the time, to invite her to realize an architecture exhibition in the French capital the following year.

From 1996 to 2001, Kristin was director of the Netherlands Architecture Institute (NAI) in Rotterdam. Together with the local team, she developed the exhibition Blank: Architecture, Apartheid and After, in which architecture and urbanism in South Africa were addressed for the first time after the end of apartheid. She was active as a curator until recently—at the Tchoban Foundation – Museum for Architectural Drawing, for example, she conceived the current exhibition, Steven Holl – Drawing as Thought.

My first encounter with Aedes was in 1992, when a student project I was involved in was exhibited there. A closer, professional collaboration began in 2001, when we prepared the first exhibition on contemporary architecture by young architects from China. Since then, we have been in regular contact—not least at informal meetings in her private apartment, where Kristin connected people, ideas, and networks as a matter of course.

She was always full of energy, had an open ear for new perspectives from other parts of the world, and specifically supported positions that had difficulty in being heard in their countries of origin. As a result, she became a highly respected international voice—not only in questions of Western building culture, but also as a bridge builder between cultures.

Kristin's central concern was to understand architecture and urban development as a cultural practice—and to take this discourse beyond the narrow circle of experts and into society. Ultimately, everyone is affected by the built environment. This mediation work requires independent platforms—interfaces between experts and the public—which she tirelessly demanded and embodied with her life's work.

Kristin's voice will be missed, but her legacy lives on—in exhibitions, catalogs, networks, and, above all, in the hearts and minds of those she supported and inspired.