The contrast between city and countryside is an age-old theme that has come to the fore once again during the coronavirus crisis. Architect Rem Koolhaas, in collaboration with the AMO think tank, created the exhibition ‘Countryside, The Future’ at the Guggenheim in New York. A gigantic tractor stands right in front of the museum, next to a conservatory bathed in bright pink light. ‘We cannot,’ says Koolhaas, ‘from within our urban bubble, pretend that the countryside is a given, and serves only to solve our problems.’

The Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas is at least as well known for his ideas as for his architecture. Although he has realised buildings all over the world with OMA (Office for Metropolitan Architecture), his body of work consists just as much of books and exhibitions. Around the turn of the century, AMO was founded, a think tank concerned not so much with building as with gathering, communicating and exchanging knowledge.