The
Manifest
This section of the exhibition is wholly dedicated to Günther Domenig’s central project, his most personal and at the same time most sculptural work, the Steinhaus in Steindorf on Lake Ossiach. The circumstances of simultaneously assuming the role of client, financier and inhabitant of the building created a situation that allowed the architect to push his personal and constructional boundaries. Its planning and realisation took over thirty years in total.
It is Günther Domenig’s great life’s work, a built architectural manifesto defined by the will for artistic expression. In none of his other projects is the medium of drawing as important as it is at the Steinhaus. It documents the design and form-finding process over the course of more than six years and tells of the importance and independence of the medium itself.
The Steinhaus is the “manifestation” and visualisation of his own intentions in their clearest and most uncompromising form. It is a concrete place with clear functions – corresponding to the typology of a residential house with a kitchen, living room, bedroom, washrooms, – and at the same time a statement of total expression; a place where the role and function of architecture finds reflection, as does the question of the desire to understand architecture as art.
Projects
- GÜNTHER DOMENIG The wooden jetty at the Steinhaus is the first action takes Günther Domenig with respect to the occupation of his grandmother’s property. The jetty does not lead from the shore into the lake, but rather out of the water and onto the land. A complicated structure, a built oscillation, a possessive gesture and an object to climb on …→ more
Steinhaus, Steindorf at Lake Ossiach 1986–2008 (Construction time)
GÜNTHER DOMENIG © Photo: Gerhard Maurer, 2022 Immediately after the construction of the Z‑Sparkasse, Günther Domenig began his first sketches of ideas for a house on the land he had inherited from his grandmother on Lake Ossiach. The building develops progressively from the lake side, beginning with a jetty that turns into a ramp along a path, w…→ more