Iberoam�rica.: Emerging architecture (2G Dossier) - Tapa blanda

Cant�s, Ariadna

9788425221538: Iberoam�rica.: Emerging architecture (2G Dossier)

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ISBN 10: 8425221536 ISBN 13: 9788425221538

Editorial: Editorial Gustavo Gili, S.L., 2008

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Iberoam�rica. Emerging architecture is a research and dissemination programme to do with the architecture of Latin America, Spain and Portugal. Sensitive to the need to support young Ibero-American architects and by striving after a vision that is both alert and flexible, 2G Dossier attempts to discover, codify, regroup and present the oeuvre of those professionals who, be it due to the scale of their work or to the low budgets involved, remain outside the habitual circuits of exposure.

They form a diverse and heterogeneous group that nevertheless recognises its similarities in its interpretation of contemporary culture. Understanding the output of this group of young architects involves a singular reading in terms of professional practice.

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Text from the introduction:

Ibero-American emergences

Latin America, Spanish America and Ibero-America: the differences between the words are subtle but they exist, mainly because we are confronted with a cultural designation of historically variable meaning. Ibero-America is not a natural or geographically continuous space but essentially an historic and cultural one, and of enormous breadth. Ibero-America is a community formed by the countries of Europe and Latin America that speak Spanish and Portuguese. In all, 22 states with 600M inhabitants who share an historical time-span whose common roots strengthen the possibility of an endless number of ways of inhabiting the world.

It is, without doubt, a privilege to be part of a transcontinental community of such richness. Sensitive to the need to support young Ibero- American architects, I initiated a research programme a while back on the basis of an international platform of permanent diffusion in order to reach those professionals who, due to the scale of their work or to the low budget they function with, remain consistently outside conventional circuits. Discovering, understanding and explaining the phenomenon of emergent Ibero-American architecture is exciting: the identification of a diverse and inherently heterogeneous group that bases its similarities on the interpretation of contemporary culture. Comprehending the output of this group of young people involves a singular lesson in ways of embarking on professional practice: they work in an individual way, in couples or in teams of up to a dozen. They manage to reduce distances by participating in the global world via the new technologies, at the same time as they isolate themselves from what is happening in their immediate surroundings. Ibero-American emergences are a network of networks; they are about gambling on a documentary platform that creates links on both sides of the Atlantic by redrawing a new cultural geography. A new map.

By the time of the Fifth Centenary of the Discovery of America, Portugal and Spain had already consolidated their democracies and the Latin-American countries had abolished their military dictatorships. But while on one side of the Atlantic the European Community was gaining strength, Latin America was going through its first lost decade. Today Europe goes on fantasising about America and America has been reinventing the Old Continent for five centuries. Then again, the continual economic and political crises of Latin America are reflected in its architectural production; at this point, the evident interaction between politics and creativity, economics and the constructing of the city, is very obvious.

The type of country and types of architects

It is necessary to make a distinction between architectural production by the type of country and types of architect.

With respect to the type of country, we shall define them according to the socio-economic reality they are going through. For example, Chile and Mexico enjoy a good economic situation that provides opportunities for the very young, plus they have numerous quality publications available and the possibility of getting a commission through competitions.

But there are also countries like Peru, Bolivia, Paraguay, Colombia and Venezuela with economic and social problems, where it is almost impossible to get a job and the possibilities of commissions or of competitions are restricted to a very few. Their cultural scene is undisciplined, dramatic but at the same time attractive: everything is unstable and changeable, contradictory and extreme. Architecture has unsuspected kinds of expression-extending as far as the non-existence of the project or of the architect-amounting to no more than the simple building managed and executed with major technological or professional deficiencies. Architects are survivors in the face of unusual realities in an extreme setting; people work with improvisation and illegality, impunity and anonymity, informality and lack of precision, irregularity and uncoordination, lack of common sense or of foresight.

Brazil is a case apart; its vastness and its intrinsic difficulties define a highly complex architectural scene that is difficult to understand unless these differences are accepted. The latest generations of Brazilian architects keep very close to their masters, most of them still alive, who form part of the juries of all competitions. What s more, they have difficulty in acceding to information and the massified schools are scattered throughout the enormous country. With regard to their aesthetic project, it has a number of consolidated bases but proceeds via geographical isolation. Perhaps this may explain a selfsufficiency of sorts in the aesthetic codes and subjects of debate that make up the disciplinary discourse. In Ruth Verde Zein s words, modern Brazilian architecture is a myth. Contemporary architecture in Brazil a mystery. What happened afterwards to Brasilia? This is an implicit question nobody articulates or writes about.

In Argentina s case, it adopts models that functioned in Europe or the United States but with a time lag of years or even decades; with a very conservative market, local architects don t take risks, very few interesting competitions are convoked and innovation and research receives very little support. In terms of the type of architect: on the one hand there are those who work on minuscule buildings, those who transgress the boundaries between art and architecture, and lastly, those who propose a new way of approaching the city.

In each instance, however, among the new generations the star architect leaves room for the professional in the street, who is closer to society, research-orientated and experimental. Among these types of architects, newness is identified with the incorporation in their repertoire of tools that come from sociology, politics, anthropology, economy and ecology. The new architects extend and transcend the limits of multidisciplinarity posited in the modern agenda of Ibero- American architects. For them, architecture isn t about objects but work systems, and they address issues like low budgets, basic needs, political and social preoccupations, timing and conceptual subversion.

In the case of those architects who dedicate themselves to small-scale projects and a reduced budget, we encounter exciting experiments like the housing extension in Buenos Aires by a77, or the freshness of Ana Rascovsky s Tigre bathhouse, the lean-to and shed by Mart�n Alonso and Daniel Rosenberg or Andr�s Jaque s Tupperware House. In a second group, consisting of architects who explore the transversality between art and architecture, we find characters like Alexis Rochas, the already established Tom�s Sarraceno, Pilar Echezarreta s similar kinds of work language-Pilar investigates the possibility of transforming space by means of the variation in rigidity of materials- the installation by Pedro Bandeira for the S�o Paulo Biennial or Andr�s Jaque s technogeisha.

A third group is composed of one-family houses inserted into the landscape, outstanding among which are the works of Sof�a von Ellrichhausen and Mauricio Pezo, the house by Alejandro and Christian Beals, and Antonio Abell�n s schemes for the irrigated area of Murcia.

The work of the collective SuperSudaca, whose objectives consist of researching, publicising and publishing, incorporating and convoking, representing, organising, dreaming... but above all, proposing. Young architects approach the city and the investigation of the territory in a different way; they work with new interactive strategies with a new focus. This is undoubtedly a view from a different, perhaps oblique, angle.

As of now we can construct a network for exchanging information and cooperation for the development of alternative proposals centred on the understanding and planning of Latin-American territory and the Iberian peninsula based on the strategic utilisation of new technologies, the exploration of emergent systems relating to biodiversity and the construction of a transversal thinking that attempts to give material form to contemporary Ibero-American identity. The biennials and the seminars of Latin-American architecture repeat the same discourses and protagonists time and time again; today we are in the presence of an intellectual and professional changeover.

So, if we accept that America was the laboratory of the Modern Movement in an uneven and fragmentary way, with the odd starring moment, what is the role of today s Ibero-America on the emergent architecture and contemporary ideas scene? For the moment, and until we come up with an answer, let s enjoy the freshness and quality of what s been found. We aren t offering a conclusion here, but making a hidden state of affairs visible, revealing something unknown, finding our way out of the labyrinth.

Copyright of the text: the authors
Copyright of the edition: Editorial Gustavo Gili SL

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