For RCR, through the wings of architecture, dreams manifest themselves in a palpable way. This is his playing field, between dreams and ideas, and its concretion in the real world, a journey between the dream of La Vila and the landscape of Olot, through an architecture that is thought and lived, like the RCR architecture. A sensory experience that crosses a Threshold space, towards the deepest dream, the RCR universe.
Description of project by Pati Núñez + Estel Ortega
ARRIVE TO THE UNIVERSAL FROM THE INTIMATE
RCR is the studio awarded the prestigious Pritzker Architecture Prize in 2017. Faced with this international recognition, at a time when its professional dimension is more public than ever, we propose an exhibition that shows the most intimate universe of Rafael, Carme and Ramon.
It is not an architecture exhibition. RCR has a particular cosmogony, a vision of the human being, of nature and of life that transcends architecture. They are philosophers who intervene on reality with the architect's own tools. As demiurges, they model the world. And they do it with the forcefulness that gives them speak a universal language that they decline from the local and the concrete.
VENICE ONE GOES TO DREAM
The Venice Biennial is the unmissable event of the sector since the first exhibition of architecture was inaugurated in 1980. Art, cinema, music and theater had been established much earlier, generating attention and interest in their disciplines. Venice captures the eyes of the world, and if there is something that matches all biennials, it is the raw material with which one works: illusion, emotion and dreams.
The Biennial acts as a catalyst for the professionals who attend each edition. We pursue inspirations, dreams and intuitions that we will transform into future projects over the coming months. We acquire a knowledge that will accompany us forever. That is why it is so interesting to us - and it is an exercise of great generosity - that brilliant and extremely sensitive minds like Rafael, Carme and Ramon share their dream and their highest aspirations.
THE DREAM OF NATURE
Nature and history is the physical place chosen to develop a space of thought and experimentation that wants to rethink the relationship of the human being with the world. This physical space is located on the farm of La Vila, in the Vall de Bianya, surrounded by forest, water, crops, farmhouses ... In this environment, research is not understood as an isolated phenomenon but as a direct contact relationship with what is explored. It is a creative, experimental project, in continuous evolution.
Technological advances and innovation are applied experientially in this geography.
There new realities are generated as the "humanitáculo", a project of synthesis of the man and the inhabit in relation with the landscape, the nature and the technology, and "the woman and the man cloud" like creative beings par excellence and creators of reality .
In Venice we present, in an unprecedented way, the dream of RCR. A utopia under construction.
Dream and Nature:
The history of an exhibition
"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of dreams."
Eleanor Roosevelt
For RCR, through the wings of architecture, dreams manifest themselves in a palpable way. This is his field of play, between dreams and ideas, and its realization in the real world.
We show them for the first time as contemporary thinkers capable of giving answers from architecture to the world around them, and highlighting this inner and unique world where the foundation of their creation is found, and from which emanate the architectural projects that today day we all know.
And it is precisely at the moment in which its dimension is more public than ever, thanks to the recognition of the Pritzker Prize (awarded in 2017), that we propose an exhibition that shows the most intimate universe of Rafael, Carme and Ramon.
And from this world of dreams, now comes an unprecedented dream. The dream of La Vila, which is that of a free architecture, naked, authentic, emotion and essence. The landscape of Olot as an experimental laboratory of architecture. Vila entails discovering a new reality that, in the form of a nebula, is presented with a slow rhythm where ideas fit, but also landscape, images, drawings and words. It represents the search for an architecture that allows building a totally genuine world of unprecedented relationships and synergies, with the emotion of being discovered.
With all this, the exhibition becomes a journey through an architecture that is thought and lived, and this is the inevitable way to really know and understand the architecture of RCR: to feel it. The traveler enters a dream, calmly and slowly, to be gently absorbed by the deepest stages of this dream.
This trip is an experience. A sensory experience of which he is a participant. Once all external reference has been canceled (and almost clandestinely accessing), the traveler will be immersed in a world of perceptions where, as in a dream, matter vanishes to give way to a sensory and emotional space, liquid, without matter.
To enter a dream, a portal is necessary. The Threshold space, when crossed, alters the perception of the known. It is the space of transition to the deepest dream. As when we sleep, before entering the rem phase, this is preceded by a state of semi-consciousness that is what is revealed here. In this, dynamic and floating images will present the RCR universe, glossing the complexity of its experience, establishing itself as a presentation space and a summary of its trajectory up to the present moment.
From this space we enter into the Dream. Absorbed progressively by an immaterial space of movement, reflections, shadows, in a sensual and voluptuous space, it is in this dream space where we come into contact with the project of La Vila, to discover it. It is a project of the future and of the present, of what is to come, and of what is being developed. Therefore, it is shown as a fragmented reality, where each one will construct his own story and obtain his own perception.
We all dream. But how is a dream shaped? How is a mental, immaterial stage materialized?
La Vila, through the Geography of dreams, is structured according to three symbolic values: body, mind and soul. Symbolized by a circle, they evoke the search for balance and absolute harmony. In Japanese calligraphy, the circle, or ensō, symbolizes a moment when the mind is free to let body and spirit form, absolute enlightenment, strength, elegance, the universe and emptiness. Only a mentally and spiritually complete person can express a true ensō.
Thus, this circle becomes the basis of the language of this new dream.
The Vila is a project that is at the key moment of its genesis. It represents the birth of an idea, a philosophy, a constructed utopia. We are witnessing, therefore, the birth of a project that is hardly in the process of being defined, structured and that begins to take shape. For this reason it is presented as a fragmented, distorted reality, and for this, it is materialized through the idea of a magnifying glass: focus-blur, definition-distortion, unity-fragmentation. These properties make it optimal for building the desired language.
Likewise, this circle evokes the value of a ritual where the idea of a specific beginning or end can not exist. Space is continuous and infinite. Imagine a non-physical space that will transport us to a mental space, built of sensible matter: a volatile, crystalline and distorted skin that envelops us. A mutable and dynamic atmosphere, where we feel abstracted from reality, but precisely because of that connected to it. Nudes of distractions. An essential space, a space of universal communication. We propose a space for action. Dynamic. Mutable Ephemeral. Like dreams.
This is a dream of nature. We are looking for a skin made of the same nature dream of La Vila: of its land, its air and the ideas it hides. I want to show a genuine language, as well as untranslatable words Japanese tradition has had to invent concepts to define our relationship with nature common to all, universal experiences, but the common language fails to describe. To do this, a mosaic of glass loupes where the images are distorted, with the aim of provoking unique and individual readings that suggest the free interpretation of each one.
This is how an experience is conceived that is built with the actions of those who live it. Who participates in the dream, will take their own dream home.
We will take the space of the Vila to a common dream, a shared dream.
In the end, nothing will be left in space, but the dream will be everywhere, for everyone and everyone.
