From 5 November 2026 to 5 April 2027, the exhibit Temporary. Structures of Necessity highlights structures that form an essential yet often overlooked part of our urban infrastructure.
The fascination with temporary utilitarian structures has accompanied the members of KOSMOS architects since their student days. For many years, they have collected examples of these ephemeral architectures – built for a limited moment, yet full of lightness, precision, and strength. A research project that takes temporariness seriously as an independent architectural category has emerged from this passion. They refer to these anonymous technical infrastructures as “tectures,” as the “constructed self” beyond “authorial” architecture.
What can we learn from temporary structures? Conventional building methods are often too slow and inflexible to respond adequately to changing challenges—social, economic, political, ecological, technological, and climatic. Temporary structures arise from specific needs. They are functional, quickly available, and designed for easy assembly, adaptation, and dismantling. This is precisely their quality: They respond immediately to change and reveal what is truly needed in a given situation. As snapshots of reality, they are direct reflections of societal demands—and a laboratory for an architecture that learns to deal with resources, time, and conditions in new ways.
This display will run parallel to the Architekturzentrum Wien permanent exhibit Hot Questions – Cold Storage, which, since 2022, provides insights into the most extensive and comprehensive collection on Austrian architecture of the 20th and 21st centuries. At the centre is the investigation of key exponents, including well-known and less well-known objects. Seven Hot Questions bring Cold Storage to life.
Exhibition: Temporary. Structures of Necessity
Concept and design: KOSMOS architects
Project management Az W: Katharina Ritter
Dates: Thu 05.11.2026 – Mon 05.04.2027
Location: Architekturzentrum Wien, Museumsplatz 11070 Vienna
More information https://www.azw.at/en/event/temporaer-strukturen-der-notwendigkeit/