Borja Fernández

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Architecture Classics: La Pagoda / Miguel Fisac

Where does the process of mythification of a work in architecture reside? What are the conditions inherently linked to the resource of memory? Firstly, the appearance of an intrinsic value within the architecture, such as highlighting the taste for the projected building. This would be accompanied by the historical factor—the echoes of the era in which it was built. If we add to all this a demolition loaded with theatricality and social drama, the building becomes something more, becoming part of the vast mythical territory of memory. Miguel Fisac's 'Pagoda,' which began construction in 1965, was demolished in just a few days in July 1999, being just over thirty years old at the time of its demolition.

Affectionately known as the 'Pagoda' by the people of Madrid, evidencing its similarity to Asian constructions, it was not held in the same esteem by the architects of the time. In the rise and fall of the JORBA Laboratories, the original name of the project, purely tragic elements converge: denunciations moved by religious conspiracies, neglect by the administrations, speculative businesses, professional jealousy, and rulers incapable of appreciating the quality of architecture that, today, becomes myth or martyr; the object of unjust destruction.

Carlo Scarpa, a Virtuous Architect of Water

Even as a child, the Venetian architect Carlo Scarpa was very aware of the fundamental element that would describe and underpin his work many years later: water. When he played and ran around the maze of streets and canals, Scarpa listened to everything around him, especially the richness of stimuli that his hometown offered him. A sensitive reader of places, he found his great text in Venice. This culture, subtle and almost academic, except for that devotion to scenography and the esoteric, is built over time; art, space, history, all compiled in his readings, trips to knowledge, and in his contact with artists and writers.

Scarpa would base his evolution as an architect on his extraordinary visual culture and his respect for tradition and the way of doing things in past eras; taking up the baton of that time and converting his reality into architectural space where all the pieces are independent units, dialoguing with each other or, as he liked to say, singing. He positions himself before what exists, whether it be an artistic piece or architectural space, from knowledge and sensitivity. He will apprehend the history and place in which it occurs and accentuate the existing beauty in things, showing the prominence of the new as a precious element.

Corrales and Molezún: Dreamlike Rational Architecture

With José Antonio Corrales and Ramón Vázquez Molezún, a situation quite common in Spanish architecture post-1950 is repeated: the lack of international projection of talented architects, largely due to the absence of theory. Apart from that, an intrinsically mysterious and enigmatic character pervades their work, deeply reinforced by the attitude of these architects towards it. They never stopped to explain it. They were never interested in providing it with a theoretical foundation. All this makes it extraordinarily difficult to understand their architecture, leaving many questions unanswered, open only to the interpretation of those who pause to reflect on them.

Corrales and Molezún have collaborated together on numerous projects sine 1952. They were very different people. José Antonio used to define himself as a "more rigorous person", while Ramón was closer to the "gaie", with a lighter, almost romantic touch. Their duo could be incarnated, respectively, as the two lobes of the brain: the left hemisphere, visual, verbal, linear, controlled, dominant, quantitative, etc. in Corrales; while the right, spatial, acoustic, holistic, contemplative, emotional, intuitive ... perhaps more accurately represents Molezún. One more couple to the long history of creation: Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, ...