Yona Friedman/Hans Ulrich Obrist

"People make too much of architecture. I have a running quarrel with architects who overestimate architecture. Reality is at eye-level with people walking down the street." Born in 1923 in Budapest, Hungary, Yona Friedman is widely considered one of the greatest utopian visionary architects of the twentieth century. Currently based in Paris, he is just as much a sociologist as a designer of buildings, more concerned with the way people interact with their environments than monumental statements by an ego-centric creator. In this illuminating talk with The Conversation Series editor Hans Ulrich Obrist, he touches on the needs of the individual in heterogeneous urban societies, past and future projects, utopia, influences and metaphysics, revealing a wise and deeply-animated humanistic intellect. Known for his 1958 manifesto, L'Architecture mobile, Friedman's ideas have remained influential. His work was featured at the 2002 Documenta.