The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum has collaborated with Rem Koolhaas and AMO, the research branch of OMA, to conduct a research project, exploring radical changes and transformations in the countryside, the vast non-urban areas of Earth. 

Titled as Countryside: Future of the World Examines Radical Changes Transforming the Nonurban Landscape, the research project, which is already underway, is also being worked with students of the Harvard Graduate School of Design, alongside AMO and Koolhaas. After finalized, the project will be presented in an exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum in fall 2019.

Organized by Guggenheim Curator of Architecture and Digital Initiatives Troy Conrad Therrien, the analytical show will present speculations about tomorrow through insights into the countryside of today. 

Countryside: Future of the World, a collaboration between Guggenheim and AMO / Rem Koolhaas examines radical changes transforming the non-urban landscape opens Fall 2019.

The exhibition will delve into artificial intelligence and automation, the effects of genetic experimentation, political radicalization, mass and micro migration, large-scale territorial management, human-animal ecosystems, subsidies and tax incentives, the impact of the digital on the physical world, and other developments that are altering landscapes across the globe.

Countryside: Future of the World, a collaboration between Guggenheim and AMO / Rem Koolhaas examines radical changes transforming the non-urban landscape opens Fall 2019. Image © Mikhaylovich Prokudin-Gorsky c. 1909

"The fact that more than 50 percent of the world’s population now lives in cities has become an excuse to ignore the countryside," said Koolhaas. 

"I have long been fascinated by the transformation of the city, but since looking at the countryside more closely in recent years, I have been surprised by the intensity of change taking place there. The story of this transformation is largely untold, and it is particularly meaningful to present it in one of the world’s great museums in one of the world’s densest cities," Koolhaas added.

Countryside: Future of the World, a collaboration between Guggenheim and AMO / Rem Koolhaas examines radical changes transforming the non-urban landscape opens Fall 2019.

Following decades of urban triumphalism, in which much of architectural production and thinking has focused on development and audiences in metropolitan areas, Countryside: Future of the World posits that rural territories are undergoing more radical reorganizations. The exhibition will explore this frontier, which has largely remained unexamined by city-focused architects.

"The Guggenheim has an appetite for experimentation and a founding belief in the transformative potential of art and architecture," said Richard Armstrong, Director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation. 

"We are excited to reengage with Rem Koolhaas, one of today’s foremost thinkers and architectural forecasters, and to embark together with a global team of researchers on an intellectual journey that will return the countryside to the cultural radar and yield urgent insights into the ways humans continue to shape and be shaped by the world around us," added Armstrong.

Rem Koolhaas. Image © Fred Ernst, Courtesy of OMA

Details and certain dates about the exhibition have not yet been officially announced as the concrete framework about the exhibition is still underway. The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum will announce further details later.

Top image: Countryside: Future of the World, a collaboration between the Guggenheim and AMO / Rem Koolhaas, examines radical changes transforming the nonurban landscape and culminates in an exhibition at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, opening fall 2019. Image © Pieternel van Velden

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