Exhibitions

Reviews and previews of the best architectural exhibitions

Poetry and pragmatism: the Chinese architect behind Beijing’s Bird’s Nest stadium

The RIBA hosts a retrospective of acclaimed Chinese architect Li Xinggang

An architect's beach house in a safe New York haven

On Fire Island, New York, Felix Augenfeld left an architectural legacy in the shape of a beach house after fleeing 1930s Europe

Quayola: the artist disappearing into three dimensions

Rome-based artist Quayola has been challenging CNC machines to do ‘crazy things’ as he reinterprets Michelangelo’s sculptures

Inhabited bridge that linked two German settlements

Old Nahe Bridge in Germany spa down is one of the most picturesque examples of the inhabited bridge

Parting shot: Space between buildings gave Jeddah sports complex endurance

Gardens and arcades supplied future flexibility

The demon thinker of Hollywood: Tim Burton unmasked

The outlook, influences and used artefacts of the cult film director

But is it Art?

What should we be enjoying at immersive art shows?

Arboreal architecture

Hidcote Manor Stilt Garden, by Martin Charles

Rena Papaspyrou and the art of deconstruction

Athenian artist's work with the elements and materials of the city at the Hellenic Centre

How architects rise to the challenges of the trickiest sites

An RIBA exhibition celebrates architects’ ability to unleash their creativity when faced with a challenging site

How to green the Gulf

Sustainable design for rising temperatures and populations

Scarpa at Castelvecchio revisited

Floating sculptures in divided grand rooms at the refitted museum in Verona

Angles of Attack: Restoring St Anne’s, Limehouse

Intense photographs by Hélène Binet of Hawksmoor churches speed restoration

Modernism adopts gothic expression

Gottfried Böhm marries concrete and glass at Church of St Albert, Saarbrucken

Anne Wynne: Postcard from Venice

A brush with the post-human, robotic world of Pierre Huyghe’s Liminal exhibition

Review: CAN tells Greenwich history through chimneys at NOW Gallery

Up in Smoke reveals the enduring appeal of the chimney

Review: Sam Jacob gives Barbie a colourful 65th birthday at the Design Museum

Strong design references underpin a journey through the Barbie-verse

Photograph: Shrubs Wood, quintessential modern house of 1930s Britain

An elegant stair encapsulates quintessential 1930s style at Shrubs Wood

Saving the world by taking inspiration from it

The many forms of nature-based design are championed in an exhibition at Roca London Gallery

Dover’s modernist masterpiece

Dover Stage Hotel, 1957, Louis Erdi

Galactic empires still relate to earthly architecture

Dune offers convincing places and realistic resonances, finds Will Wiles

Artistic interpretation: artists help RIBA shake off imperialist vestiges

Artworks tackle themes of race, gender and colonialism

Review: Enzo Mari ‘design’s conscience’

A retrospective of Italian designer Enzo Mari at the Design Museum demonstrates his commitment to empowering the user

Cardiff’s first modernist building, Wales Empire Pool, 1958

Design was compared to London’s Royal Festival Hall

Fanciful Figures review: architectural drawing comes to life

‘Without the figures it’s just beige, beige, beige’

Smallbrook Ringway, ‘The one really hopeful building in Birmingham’

Ian Nairn’s praise for Smallbrook Ringway hasn’t saved it from demolition

Exhibition: V&A shows how tropical architects localised modernism

Locals made ‘progressive, optimistic’ style their own

The golden age of glass-roofed shopping arcades

The Galleria Umberto 1, Naples, 19th century

Lasdun’s Lyttelton Theatre: Stalking the boards

Royal National Theatre, South Bank, London, 1976

Paolozzi and friends: charming, idiosyncratic and subversive collaborator

Study of under-represented works highlights collaborations from fashion to homeware

CUTE is a delight for the senses but has a darker complexity

An exploration of cuteness in contemporary culture and how it can help navigate a route through the world

New House, Hampstead: contemporary 1939 take on traditional materials

A sad story lies behind Samuel & Harding’s late work

Favourite books: Sympathies and affinities with the creative process

Geoff Shearcroft recommends Art is Magic by Jeremy Deller

Space, Rhythm & Light illuminates Kim Lim at the Hepworth

Wakefield gallery revives modernist sculptor and exponent of ‘musicality and rhythm’

Playing house: MJ Long exhibition review

Portraits of a Practice at the Architectural Association

Review: Hiroshi Sugimoto’s Time Machine offers ‘a tonic for our distracted minds’

One man’s inner idea of reality expressed through his camera