Good evening, Memos and Jose! Congratulations, of course, for this initiative; I believe this is a first in Greece, actually opening up to the world like that and scouting for young talent. Memos, let us begin with you first: You have been the curator of this project: How long have you been working on it and how did you come up with the idea initially? Who started it?
MF: Well, actually it`s a long time, it might be something like a year that we`ve been working on this project; you know, it needs a lot of small gestures and preparations because everything is digital so we had to find not only the critics but we also had to prepare everything so that the platform, the basic platform for judgment at first stage [would work] and the promotion of these works should be digital – should be the internet. So, the initial challenge was to prepare all these mechanisms that would allow the critics to judge from their homes in Madrid or in Lisbon etc. in case we would have more than 150 submissions. Eventually we had 470 submissions, thus this procedure proved invaluable: the judges were able to preselect 101 projects before meeting in Athens. If they were to review in Athens those 470 submissions of different projects, different things, different priorities, it would be almost chaotic, it would never work. So the whole process in preparing that and creating a platform – both in Greek and in English, so that the students` work could be distributed through the web everywhere in the world – was a high priority that needed a lot of preparation actually.
Were you also the one who chose the jury?
MF: Yes, the jury was a kind of statement: I always understand that the jury is the one that decides what kind of results you will have and I believe that to choose those three architects was a statement. We didn`t want to have, let`s say, a “theoretician” or a “historian” or somebody very important in a University where there are a lot of Greek students. What we first wanted to have was practitioners, in a middle age between 50 and 40, and then have people that would relate to a certain “Mediterranean” aspect of architecture instead of going, let`s say, taking Snohetta or taking someone from Australia. We wanted to have this common Portuguese – Spanish – Greek element because I firmly believe there is a connection going many years ago between those three countries and we have been influenced immensely by what has been happening in Spain and in Portugal. Not only because of the climate, but because of the way modernism has evolved in these countries, it is really miraculous. I think that if those kids are to be judged and have a dialog with what`s happening internationally, I believe that the most important thing is to bring them in contact with the pioneers of today`s architecture, the pioneers who are there, in the particular scale of buildings and then maybe, the dialog may begin.
This is well understood. However, as a curator, you must have had some vision or anticipation that goes well beyond this (pretty overarching) “Mediterranean” prerequisite in selecting the jury. Of course, you did choose architects who are “Mediterranean” and can relate both to the way architects in Greece are educated as well as to the conditions of professional practice; but why those particular architects? Didn`t you, as curator, expect from those specific members of the jury to perform in a particular way? What was the curatorial argument in this selection, to put it plainly like that?
MF: Yes. I could have selected three people who are similar and it would have been easy, it`s quite easy to do things like that, to create a “cohesive” group and, let`s say, promote a “school” of architecture. What I wanted was something different altogether: To create diversity within the group of critics and to open up different possibilities. So, [Nikos] Ktenas does a different kind of architecture than Jose [Selgas], and Jose is different from Manuel [Aires Mateus], but in my personal judgment, they all represent the best possible alternatives, the best possible paths that modernism could ever follow. So, to have those three architects come together and judge the works, I think that would end in a very good result.
So it was about “deconstructing”, somehow, our own, local perception of modernism by opening up different possibilities…
MF: Exactly.
…even divergent, yet still coherent.
MF: Exactly, yes.
Thank you. So, now, Jose, thank you very much as well for your lecture today, I was really impressed at how disciplined your architecture seemed to me [laughing]. And by “disciplined” I mean something very specific: It was pretty clear that you`re one among those few people who can think “outside of the box” and innovate; yet in order to do that, there has to be a box.
JS: Yes… [laughing]
…What is this box made of? To make myself more clear, I`m going to use a somewhat funny example: By explaining your work in front of an audience, it was as if answering to some professor who probably gave you a hard time at school, the kind of person who would dictate that “you have to use natural light”, “you have to respect nature”, “you have to think of tactile qualities in your surfaces” and so on. So, the answer to all of these was “I did it”, but more like “…but I did it my way”. And this is what I mean by “box”.
JS: Yes, I understand you… [laughing] The “box” is the same for all the architects, more or less. It`s a very simple box. There`s quite simple things in there that are required in each project. It would have been nice if some teacher gave us all those few things [laughing]. But it is true we had a very good school of architecture in Madrid – and it still is a very good one. Of course there`s plenty of other things when you want to make it more complicated, but in the end what counts above all is the economy. The economy is the most important determining factor in architecture.
Would you like to elaborate some more on that?
JS: Yes. At some previous lecture, someone asked me “how do you convince people to do what you propose? How do you convince, for example, the Municipality of Cartagena to have those facades in those materials?”. So, the only way to convince people to have things done this way is the economy. You tell them, “O.K., you`re not sure about this material, but, you know, this costs one and this costs ten – what do you prefer?”. So they immediately begun to think “it`s not so bad!”, “let`s try, let`s try, come on!” [laughing]. The economy is always the means to arrive to such ends.
Yes, I understand this is a pretty valid argument perhaps for the client; but an argument to convince an architect?
JS: It`s the same, this is an argument we use among ourselves too. The economy is also part of the box. The economy is not limited to materials only, it also extends for example to the use of LED for artificial light, decisions to make the volumes as precise as possible, the good use of small space… Economy in all senses. Also, economy in thought. People tend to respond to buildings and understand them immediately because of the economy in thought, it is also very important. For example, they understand that this building is here because it`s in the harbor, in Cartagena, that this building is round because it`s a corrida in Badajoz, they immediately understand.
True, communication is always a very crucial matter. Speaking of which, what really struck me is that most of those buildings that you showed today – fun, inventive, experimental – were the result of competitions. You won those competitions in presentation boards: How do you represent all those qualities, not to mention the beauty that comes as the result of experimentation, before you even have someone see the end result? How do you communicate that?
JS: Well, it`s almost impossible. It`s true, in the beginning you have a section, you have a decision of how to use a building, everything… In the end, of course, during construction, is when you decide on the materiality of the building, the details and all, but of course it`s impossible to show all of that from the beginning, it`s always the same problem. And our models also have this problem because we like very much to work with plants, with nature, with color, representing that is absolutely, quite difficult. Maybe this is the most difficult problem we have in the studio in those competitions. But anyway, you may not have the end materiality, but you must be versatile. We won the competition in Badajoz because it was clear, it was so “stupid” that we were very clear. We were the only ones to be so clear. So we might have been missing some things but it was – how to say it…
…Powerful?
JS: No, not powerful, something else: Clear. Evident. What I said before, it was so stupid that it seemed like it was there, and once you convince people that it`s there, it`s done. Maybe that`s the most difficult thing in the whole process, you have to struggle a little bit until you arrive to the point where you can say “this is the thing, this is it”. An then it just goes along.
Actually another reason why I ask you this question is because you were invited here as member of the jury in this (indeed) GREAT initiative, to pass judgment on a number of representations of works that you saw. What was it exactly that caught your eye? What clicked to you in order to make your selection?
JS: Well, I don`t know very much about the actual situation of the new cities in Greece, and we are not related at all through the University… But what mostly impressed me here was the great variety, the variety of resources, the variety of thoughts. Of course there are some “schools”, some clear schools, but in the end there was a great variety of approaches to a project. In fact this is what we tried to bring here, we tried to bring this variety to the surface. I don`t know if this is the result of a big number of people studying abroad and bringing in new ideas and a variety of thoughts, but this is fundamental for the future of architecture in Greece – also.
I understand, but this is not exactly what I had in mind… It`s no surprise that there is an easily discernible number of schools but still, even within the framework of schools, individuality does prevail. Perhaps what you talked about before was your impression of the whole material you had to review. But what was it that made you select some particular projects instead of others, what was the quality that you saw to convince you that you saw promise in this and not that, for example?
I think this is not a matter of individual projects, the most interesting thing is that variety of approaches, diverse mentalities, diverse schools… There was individuality there too but it was not the most important.
Out of those “young” perspectives that you saw – because those were always young people – where do you see both this body of architecture going to in the future or even architecture as a whole?
JS: I`m absolutely optimistic about this experience here in Greece – that I didn`t expect maybe. People have a more sensitive approach compared to the older generations of architects. They are now following a direction of great sensibility towards many things. They are more socially engaged, more respectful of their surroundings, more respectful of nature, of history also. I`m absolutely optimistic and I was also very impressed. Maybe in the beginning I was expecting more “Greek schools” (which there are, of course – there are some similar projects) but in the end my impression was that there is an incredible number of people working with much greater sensibility towards things; a much more precise inclination towards “small” things – and I`m sure the exhibition is going to display that.
We`re all really looking forward to it! And a final one: Through your work you probably made us accept and love our contemporary material culture, experimenting with it while remaining within the “discipline” of architecture as we know it – and never have seen it before. But your final project, at the Venice Biennial, I believe that one went even beyond the established boundaries, opening up to different spheres, such as ecology, the environment, mechanics… What was it that made you choose that direction to explore in Venice? How do you see architecture being engaged in that direction in the coming future?
JS: Well, our only concern is nature, more or less. But nature is not a work of specialized individuals, nature is the work of all human beings, there are so many things related to nature… But are you asking me about the future of architecture?
Not really, I wouldn`t put it in such generic terms. Rather, I would like to ask what caught your own curiosity to explore that territory beyond the object, even in spite of your own “brand” – to use an expression that could be easily misunderstood and yet communicates quite well what I had in mind… Until now, you had experimented with the potential of plastics, intense colors and so on. At Venice, you opened up to a fusion between architecture, mechanics and hydroponics – as an architectural project, nonetheless. Why?
At the Biennial we had a collaboration with a number of different people, some biologists, other researchers in their own field, but we also tried to provide them with other possibilities to investigate and experiment, more connected with architecture. So the Biennial was the opportunity to do that – at the Biennial we have all the opportunities to go in this direction, for instance we have been working with a University in Sydney doing a new experiment. I think it is our duty to work this way…
…Interdisciplinary?
Interdisciplinary – yes, of course. We are absolutely interested in such collaborations because there are incredible amounts of interesting things out there in other fields that we now have no relation at all with. Architects also need to go in that direction, there is no other possibility. I believe all my generation, our generation, is now researching what happens with nature, what happens with our environment, we are not allowed to remain the same way as we are used to. In this fucking new world we keep doing stupid things [laughing], such huge buildings for nothing… Now we are training to be more careful with all those things and this is the direction of things to come. It is not just our own direction, there is a whole army of architects now going towards that direction.
Thank you very much! And we are really looking forward to the exhibition in May!
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