Architecture studio Flores & Prats, led by the architects Ricardo Flores and Eva Prats, participates in the 18th Venice Architecture Biennale showing their way of working through the exhibition-installation "Emotional Heritage" invited by Lesley Lokko as part of the “Dangerous Liaisons” section of the main exhibition at the Corderie del Arsenale in Venice.

The installation is presented as a translation of the space in which they work, a representation of their own studio in Barcelona, in which they develop a complex work system. A process of analysis and capture of layers, fragments, models, and drawings with which they recover the memory of the buildings and the place, through a personal approach to renovation.
The installation «Emotional Heritage» is structured around four sections that bring together a series of projects with which they explain their work ideas: «Draw over time», in which they present their project for the Mills Museum in Palma de Mallorca (2002); "Use value", which is explained through the projects, the Almacén Yutes de Barcelona (2005), and the Sala Beckett, also in Barcelona (2017); «The open condition of the ruin», explained with the Variétés Cultural Laboratory of Brussels (currently in progress); and, finally, “The right to inherit”, with which they present two other projects, the Casal Balaguer Cultural Center in Mallorca (2016), and the Favorita Fab Lab in Barcelona (under construction).

"Emotional Heritage" by Flores & Prats. Photograph by Adrià Goula.

This is the fourth time that Flores & Prats participates in the Venetian event. After the Biennale Architettura 2014 as part of the Collateral Event “Grafting Architecture. Catalonia at Venice,” the Biennale Architettura 2016 in the Spanish Pavilion (awarded Leone d’Oro for the Unfinished exhibition) and the Biennale Architettura 2018 in the main exhibition FREESPACE curated by Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara and in the Holy See Pavilion (along with 9 other international architects, they were each invited to build a chapel on San Giorgio Island — their chapel is still open to the public), this year Ricardo Flores and Eva Prats were invited by Lesley Lokko to be part of the “Dangerous Liaisons” section of the main exhibition at the Corderie of the Arsenale in Venice. The section is composed of practitioners from around the world who work across disciplinary boundaries, geographies, and new forms of partnership and collaboration.

The audience is invited to experience how Flores & Prats observe places and built spaces as repositories of emotions and memories. According to Ricardo Flores and Eva Prats, “People are not the only ones to contain the memory of a place. Buildings are also imbued with memories of the uses and lives that occupy them.


"Emotional Heritage" by Flores & Prats. Photograph by Adrià Goula.

The built environment reflects social behavior, speaking of a way of using the ground, sky, and a way of inhabiting. As an architect, reading the memories held in buildings and people is to think about a future that counts on the past.” This idea is reflected in the studio’s cultural approach and in its projects, especially those focused on the rehabilitation of old structures for new occupations.

The architects also suggest that when a building is closed and abandoned, it still remains alive in the memories of those who lived there. These abandoned buildings carry civic and moral values embedded through use and time, along with the stories of the people who used them over the years. These occupations have created an invisible constellation of social relationships that expand the influence of the building to a universe around it.
 
METALOCUS is live reporting from the Venice Architecture Biennale, which takes place from 20 May to 26 November 2023. See METALOCUS Guide LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA for all the latest information you need to know to attend and know the best events and pavilions in LA BIENNALE.

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May 20 to November 26, 2023.
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"Emotional Heritage" is part of the "Dangerous Liaisons" section of the main exhibition at the Corderie del Arsenale in Venice, Italy.
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Flores & Prats is an architecture studio based in Barcelona. Established in 1998 by Eva Prats and Ricardo Flores, it is dedicated to confronting theory and academic practice with design and construction activity. The studio has been involved in several kinds of projects, especially for Public Administration through open competitions. These include residential and public buildings as well as public spaces, and also exhibition design and site-specific installations for major cultural institutions and museums such as Tàpies Foundation, Miró Foundation, and Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona. www.floresprats.com

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Published on: May 26, 2023
Cite: "Think architecture by layers. "Emotional Heritage" by Flores & Prats" METALOCUS. Accessed
<http://www.metalocus.es/en/news/think-architecture-layers-emotional-heritage-flores-prats> ISSN 1139-6415
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