RE-CONSTRUCTING REALITY
Ethical gestures as provocative stances
with Lucinda Correia
MAAT MODE — THE PEOPLE INTERVIEWS
This series of informal conversations aims to disclose the ideas and research behind a selected number of projects commissioned for maat Mode 2020. Some of these dialogues were recorded during the lockdown in April and May 2020, while others were held live in the maat Media Room, a space designed as part of Beeline, SO – IL’s museum-wide architectural intervention.
All photos © efabula.
maat / Nuno Ferreira de Carvalho
Lucinda Correia is an architect and researcher. Her PhD thesis, “The (Un)certainty of the Norm. Architecture, Law and Public Policies in Dialogue,” explores and deepens the reciprocal implications between legislation, design and architectural practices. Counter-Architecture. Re-Constructing Reality is a collaborative research project curated by Lucinda for maat that organises four performative actions, talks and debates, leading to the issuance of a green paper in the year in which Lisbon is the European Green Capital. The declared aim is to reflect on the future of “urbanity”.
Lucinda, thank you for taking the time to answer our questions. We are now entering the countdown phase, and the preparations to your project are certainly at an advanced stage, (dates: 16 and 25 September, and 2 and 7 October, 2020). Can you please describe it for us in general terms?
We have the moral obligation to ask the question: “what will be the role of Architecture in the near future?”
Lucinda Correia
Lucinda Correia
Thank you, Nuno, for giving me an opportunity to clarify some aspects of Counter-Architecture. Re-Constructing Reality. This is a research project that seeks mainly to ask questions and not provide answers, the ultimate goal being to call architects to action. Today we hear over and over again that the crossing of disciplines is essential for enabling dialogue and a broader understanding of things. Architects know that they need to come out of their comfort zones and try to listen to what other disciplines have to say in this strategic moment where architectural practice has to be re-framed and re-thought. With regard to the environmental crisis we are living in, which has (now) culminated in a pandemic outbreak, we have the moral obligation to ask the question: “what will be the role of Architecture in the near future?” – because by rethinking construction and urbanity we will ultimately be setting up new tasks as well as redefining the responsibility architecture has with regard to the impact of human interventions on the environment. Counter-Architecture. Re-Constructing Reality, which is taking place at maat (and will also be livestreamed) between September 2020 and January 2021, was designed as a series of four cycles of performative actions, talks and debates addressing the state of the art on the environmental impact of architectural practices, aiming to generate productive cross-disciplinary solutions and, perhaps, new critical approaches to future scenarios. We propose four binary axes as filters for approaching the subject: reality/fantasy; control/transgression; disclosure/concealment; and logic/absurd. The performative actions (on video) will dramatically open the cycles by exploring the four binary axes as provocative positions. The talks (by video conference) will present the perspectives on the subject matter of four international architects. The debates will develop the subject matter further by bringing together Portuguese architects, economists, engineers, geographers, civil servants, members of the government, scientists, sociologists, jurists, builders, real estate developers, researchers and other urban actors. A Green Paper will be eventually published, given that in 2020 Lisbon is the European Green Capital, seeking to reflect the relevant content of the four cycles, which I consider by itself an enduring critical objective.
maat
The concept of Counter-Architecture seems to be still at an embryonic stage. Is it really an idea that emerged only recently, or does it already have some kind of history?
Lucinda Correia
Counter-Architecture is an operative concept that sets out to spark a regenerative and collaborative process aimed at rethinking urbanity today. In a broader sense, Counter-Architecture seeks to question the binary axis: Architecture/Nature – can Architecture reinvent itself only by reconceptualising its relationship with nature? Counter-Architecture also questions the involvement of science and culture with Architecture as a complex system. It thus proposes a responsible participation through the performative actions, interdisciplinary talks and debates by fostering the role of the citizen as a relevant and critical contributor with regard to the growing artificiality of the built environment, as well as the logics of land use and property. The aim is that the citizen be a well-informed and engaged agent in a tendentially circular economy, as normally recommended by sustainable strategies. By all means, this other form of performing Architecture will potentially usher in a new set of connections with the world and new criteria in the production of Architecture and the arts in general. In short, I believe that with a new ethical approach to human activity towards the environment, a new aesthetic will surely emerge. Perhaps one that can harmonise nature, culture, science and technology through the lenses of Architecture. We urgently need an ethical gesture towards creating a new relationship with life.
maat
The programme is structured into a series of four cycles, each one chaired by one of four binary axes. Could you please tell us briefly what axes these are? And explain to us what advantages you found in structuring your approach along these lines?
Lucinda Correia
The four binary axes, as mentioned before, are: reality/fantasy; control/transgression; disclosure/concealment; and logic/absurd. Each one of these double-filters represents a “horizon of possibilities” where the subject can be widely explored regarding the performative actions, interdisciplinary talks and debates. #1 reality/fantasy corresponds to the psychological dimension which explores how institutional fictions influence the way we perceive the world, therefore forcing architects to re-interpret and give new meaning to reality. #2 control/transgression stands for the legal dimension of things, meaning the management of permissions and prohibitions. Architecture must take a creative and critical stance here – towards this artificial framework that needs to be constantly questioned. #3 disclosure/concealment depicts the communicational dimension which allows us to decode the representation of the world. Architecture as a technical and artistic product has a twofold responsibility, acting as an encoder and a decoder of that representation. #4 logic/absurd underpins the philosophical dimension which reclaims a revision of our value system in order to re-evaluate and to reconceive a responsible spatial practice aimed at confronting the environmental crisis. All four binary axes intersect with each other and hopefully the debates will result in previously unimagined key questions that will contribute to deepen further discussions and trigger future actions.
In a broader sense, Counter-Architecture seeks to question the binary axis: Architecture / Nature.
Lucinda Correia
maat
And what role do performative actions play in that structure? Namely, articulating with the talks and the debates?
Lucinda Correia
Each performative action moment is a reflection on how to open a themed conference to a wider audience and on how that opening could creatively frame the sequence of activities. For Counter-Architecture the opening of each cycle stands as an anthropological perspective on the main subject, so each performative action (in the form of video) represents a shout, a confession, a moment of sharing thoughts, emotions, fears that aims to reach and involve everyone – architects, artists, engineers, politicians, scientists, geographers, researchers, students and citizens, so as to “do away with” the preconception that “scientific encounters” are intended for specialists only. Counter-architecture wants to engage with people interested in architecture, ecology, citizenship, and in the future of our cities and the planet. In that sense, I thought of bringing in the theatrical, as if a certain degree of humanity were being lost in scientific and disciplinary debates, firstly because the focus is on crossing disciplinary boundaries and really listening to each other’s perspectives and approaches. The texts for each performative action are excerpts from a play from 1998 called: Quadros de uma Exposição ou uma Representação quase Ecológica do Mundo [Pictures at an Exhibition or an Almost Ecological Representation of the World] by J. D. Gorjão Jorge. What is striking about this play, which has never been performed before, especially given the current scenario, is that it seems to have been written today and, in a very curious way outlines the four binary axes. I invited Pedro Penim, the founder of Teatro Praga, to direct this creative process. Since the beginning, the idea was that each performative action would work as a trigger reporting to each binary axis and simultaneously launching a certain state of mind. More than just a content, each performative action reveals paradoxes and doubts, and both the guests and the audience find themselves implicated in the process of questioning. This state of mind, which informs the resulting talks and debates is, above all, a scenic device that will perform an inversion between those who are supposed to ask and those who are supposed to answer.
maat
Can you please tell us a little about the participants?
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(1) Ghosn, Rania, El Hadi Jazairy (2018), Geostories: Another Architecture for the Environment, New York-Barcelona: Actar Publishers, p. 22.
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(2) www.spatialagency.net (consulted online: July 2020).
Lucinda Correia
We will have four international architects and sixteen domestic guests from diverse backgrounds – architecture, economy, engineering, environmental studies, landscape architecture, law, geography, management, philosophy, physics and sociology. The four performative actions that introduce each cyclical theme will be represented by three actresses and an actor from Teatro Praga.
Session #1: reality/fantasy – the guest for talk #1 is Rania Ghosn, an architect, geographer and Assistant Professor at M.I.T., and also founding partner of Design Earth Studio (USA). She will explain how “architectural drawing is a device that brings the Earth into matters of concern” (1) and how it might change our perception towards the environment. The four guests for debate #1 are: Miguel Ferreira Mendes (architect at CRAterre); Pedro Matos Soares (physicist and professor), Susana Fonseca (sociologist and activist); and Viriato Soromenho-Marques (professor of philosophy). Along with the moderator, Alexandra Paio, they will elaborate on the state of the art and the implications of being in a “climate emergency” situation.
Session #2: control/transgression – the guest for talk #2 is Neil Leach, an architect and professor at many leading schools of architecture (UK). The talk will explore the concepts of “disciplinary societies” and “societies of control” with regard to the relationship between architecture and politics. The four guests for debate #2 are: Idalina Baptista (environmental engineer); João Miranda (jurist and professor of Law); Lia Vasconcelos (community planner); Paulo Carapuça (manager and executive director of Casais). Together with José Bragança de Miranda (the moderator), they will analyse how the constraints of a normative society can affect the future of urban development as a result of major impacts on the environment.
Session #3: disclosure/concealment – the guest for talk #3 is Tatjana Schneider, an architect and professor at the Technical University of Braunschweig (DE), who will share her experience based on the “Spatial Agency” research project on “a new way of looking at how buildings and space can be produced” (2) and how this extends the responsibility of architecture. The four guests for debate #3 are: Diogo Teixeira (engineer and project manager at Essentia); Filipa Roseta (architect and member of the Portuguese Parliament); João Gomes da Silva (landscape architect and professor); Rita Vieira Cruz (economist and activist). Along with the moderator, Patrícia Canelas, they will look at the importance of information and participation in the construction of a more sustainable and equitable urban space.
Session #4: logic/absurd – the guest for talk #4 is Lars Lerup, architect, Dean Emeritus at the Rice School of Architecture, Houston Texas and Professor Emeritus of the University of California at Berkeley (USA), who will delve into the question of, given “climate destruction”, what the fundamental elements are that architecture needs to perform in the near future. The four guests for debate #4 are: Ana Pinho (architect and state secretary for housing in the current Portuguese government); Eduardo Brito-Henriques (geographer and professor); Lígia Nunes (architect and president of ASF International); and Pedro Martins Barata (economist and expert in international climate policy). With the moderator, Sandra Marques Pereira, they will look at the issue of what is lacking for the building of a strategy for a habitat culture and the role of national and international climate policies in this process.
maat
The second part of the project, the collaborative “Green Paper for the Public Administration and Cultural Institutions”, appears to be a step that is not very common in this type of project. What is your aim and what objectives do you intend to achieve with this proposal?
Lucinda Correia
Local development policies can function as guidelines of cultural inscription by coping with reality and codifying the experiences of everyday life. Culture, on the one hand, finds its support in law, as a coercive device that imposes the limits of action on the members of any society; and on the other hand, in art, as a symbolic mirror of ways of thinking and behaviours which translate reality into aesthetically qualified forms. By extension, Architecture as a discipline of Humanities is also affected by this assumption. So, this collaborative Green Paper for the Public Administration and Cultural Institutions, regarded as a lasting “critical object”, will gather relevant information from the performative actions, the talks and the debates and will also bring together a number of interviews with key urban actors on the role and the responsibility of Architecture in the near future resulting from the current environmental crisis. The aim of publishing a Green Paper is to foster a serious open discussion aimed at rethinking the Architecture/Nature relationship, but it is also mainly to prove that a degree of inertia in outlining a strategic action plan to deal with the environmental crisis has more to do with morals than with markets, even though the economic transformation is a key factor for a green transition process.
maat
To conclude, dare I suggest an exercise in futurology? Will the paradigm shift, in terms of our way of life and the consumption of the planet's resources, and which is absolutely necessary and urgent, take place in our generation? It seems clear that there are several indicators that it is already occurring, but is there any way of speeding up the change process?
Architecture, by means of its existence, creates Culture.
Lucinda Correia
Lucinda Correia
“The state of society depends at every moment on the associations between many actors, most of whom do not have human forms. This is true of microbes – as we have known since Pasteur – but also of the internet, the law, the organization of hospitals, the logistics of the state, as well as the climate” (3) – wrote Bruno Latour to remind us of the concept of ecosystem, a community of interacting organisms in a given environment which will consequently transform and reorganize that environment. Since the quality of our interactions depends on our perception of reality and on our engagement with life, Architecture is not a pure physical system – within the human process, Architecture, by means of its existence, creates Culture. In that sense, Counter-Architecture aims to foster interdisciplinary research involving a diversity of key actors, so that we can understand what common threads could guide architectural practices to develop creative and regenerative strategies in response to our environmental crisis. We can only change if we tune our perceptions and join all our efforts to fight actual “climate destruction”, as Viriato Soromenho-Marques (our guest for debate #1) has explained: “we have already known enough to begin the energy transition since around 1988.” (4) What has prevented States from acting? What has hindered mass community action? The influence of advertising? The strength of propaganda? The limits set by certain religious knowledge? The lack of education? The internet has been currently available since the middle 1990s, and most of us, inhabitants of the world, have had access to scientific information, public lectures and official documents, on the one hand confirming the impacts of human activities on the planet, in what is now known as the Anthropocene era, and, on the other, predicting all sorts of dark future scenarios. Rapid change is already taking place, so our only option is to become agents of that change and not its victims if we want to live our life on the planet Earth.
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(3) critinq.wordpress.com/2020/03/26/is-this-a-dress-rehearsal (consulted online: June 2020).
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(4) www.dn.pt/edicao-do-dia/19-ago-2018/o-que-vamos-dizer-aos-nossos-filhos-9724761.html (consulted online: June 2020)
Lucinda Correia is an architect and researcher. Her Ph.D. thesis “The (Un)certainty of the Norm. Architecture, Law and Public Policies in Dialogue” explores and deepens the reciprocal implications between legislation design and architectural practices. In 2019, Correia founded efabula – towards a habitat culture, a Lisbon-based practice in architecture and research in arts and humanities.
Counter-Architecture. Re-Constructing Reality is a collaborative research-project curated by Lucinda Correia for maat, co-organised with efabula, that brings to stage four performative actions, talks and debates that result in a green paper, aimed to think the future of “urbanity”.
