Ragusa, 19th April 2019 at 5:30PM. In the magnificent Palazzo del Governo in Ragusa, Paolo Brescia, introduced by Michele Nastasi, engages the audience in a talk on the idea of building on the built: architecture “there since forever”.
Build on the Built: architecture “there since forever”
In the magnificent Palazzo del Governo in Ragusa, Paolo Brescia, introduced by Michele Nastasi, engages the audience in a talk on the idea of building on the built: architecture “there since forever”.
It is clear that having to minimize further land consumption and to favor interventions that re-evaluate what we have received, building and built must acquire a new contemporary meaning within a unified vision. Architecture, in fact, is not the sum of its parts, but rather a whole. In building on the built there is no “style”, there is no difference between expressive and constructive logic.
We are convinced that building on the built can produce a new beauty, which will celebrate the work of those who came before us and the lives of those who lived there before. This will be possible if the architect, as an ancient Greek, will be able to keep together theory and practice, action and thought, logic and sensibility.
We think that the essence of the architectural work lies in its contingent conditions. There is no a-priori essence. It is “built” on the work’s contingencies, but never “applied” to it.
But, if it is true that the essence of the project is based on its contingencies, it is also true that it is the architecture that makes the place. We believe, in fact, that at a certain point architecture becomes a sort of “memory of an absolute future”, with its own life, beyond time and functions.
It is between this contingent essence and this memory of an absolute future that we pursue the idea of architecture that is “there since forever”, superimposing the present with the past and the future.