–one way or other–
In autumn 2018, de Waal’s first architectural intervention in America opened at the Schindler House: a landmark of West Coast Modernism, built in 1922 in West Hollywood by Viennese émigré architect, Rudolph Schindler.
Conceived as a modular, changeable live-work building for two families, the house became a site of forward-thinking aesthetic, cultural and political activity, frequented by architects, dancers and artists from Frank Lloyd Wright to John Cage.
For de Waal, the Schindler House 'is an idea about beginnings. It stands as an attempt to create a place for both cooperative living and cooperative practice, to reset the conditions in which a modern family could live and experiment...The last decades of travelling to Vienna have made me think of what it might mean to be an émigré and build a house, to question what you bring with you when you start again so definitively.’ The exhibition included recent works, made in direct response to the materials and spaces of the house, and a sound piece conceived with the composer, Simon Fisher Turner, 'a layered memory soundscape of Vienna through its Raumplan, its volumes’.