Power Architecture
“Power Architecture” is the inaugural exhibition of Casa da Arquitectura. Curated by architects Jorge Carvalho, Pedro Bandeira, and Ricardo Carvalho, the exhibition will occupy about 800 square meters of the Exhibition Hall with a proposal that thinks about “eight powers that align, inflict and diverge each other”. For the curators, “the power of architecture is a fundamental theme for the way in which contemporary society and architecture can work together”. And they proceed: “Architecture is not only the expression of a single power, it reflects and works from different powers. For that reason we have decided to isolate those that seem to clarify this complex cartography. This way the collective, regulative, technologic, economic, domestic, cultural, newsworthy and ritual powers arise. In the long path of the relationship between man and nature, culture, and technology these powers played with strengths of different intensities in the production of architectural artefacts and the drawing of the city and the territory. Today, when faced with political impotence that excuses and validates decisions that harm the public thing and the meaning of communities, there seems to be room for a new reflection on power”, we can read in the opening text of the book that accompanies the exhibition, coedited by Casa da Arquitectura and the Swiss publisher Lars Muller.
The Curators
Jorge Carvalho is an architect that graduated from the Faculty of Architecture of Oporto. In 1991, he founded, with Teresa Novais, the studio aNC arquitectos, whose works have been awarded, published and presented internationally. He is a guest teacher at the Architecture Department of the Faculty of Sciences and Technologies of the University of Coimbra. As an author of essays, his field is contemporary architecture.
Pedro Bandeira is an architect that graduated from the Faculty of Architecture of Oporto. He is a researcher (LAB 2PT) and teacher at the Architecture School of University of Minho. He is the author of several books on architecture: “Projectos Específicos para um Cliente Genérico” [Specific Projects for a Generic Client] (2006), “Escola do Porto Lado B (1868-1978) [Porto School Side B (1868-1978)] (2014)”. He was awarded the prize Crítica e Ensaística de Arquitectura AICA 2015 and Arcosanti 2012 (2017).
Ricardo Carvalho is an architect that graduated from the Faculty of Architecture of Lisbon and has a PhD from IST, University of Lisbon. He founded the studio Ricardo Carvalho + Joana Vilhena Arquitectos in 1999. He is a teacher and the director of the Architecture department at the University of Autónoma in Lisbon and was a guest teacher in University of Navarra, Spain (2013) and Carleton, Canada (2016). He regularly writes about architecture.