Dulux Study Tour 2023

Lisbon's 'foreign object'

Day 6

Edwina Brisbane leans on the group to help her stay open-minded during their visit to Lisbon's Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology.

I was pretty sure I wouldn't like the Museum of Art, Architecture and Technology (MAAT) by Amanda Levete Architects, but am trying to be open-minded. A big conceptual gesture often doesn’t have a human-scale experience, doesn’t offer up more as you approach, return or wander through. There is a lack of generosity in the experience.

The big concept, or object, often has a tenuous line of connection to the site. Doesn’t consider layers of time, culture and typography. The urban conditions become abstracted and the antidotes to a site’s pitfalls are put aside for the pureness of the gesture while the good to be embraced isn’t leverage.

How do you occupy a big idea? How does it keep chatting to you beyond the punch line?

Yesterday, João Luís Carrilho da Graça spoke to us about the city of Lisbon as a cinematic experience of seduction and possibilities resulting in a climax as a counterpoint to the American city where buildings stand as a divisive moment of seduction. His preference is the latter. He likes to create a moment of fascination when you encounter his work, to love or hate it. MAAT has had a divisive moment on me. It is possible Carrilho da Graça was trying to be divisive in the conversation itself, as the two projects of his we visited, S.Jorge Castle Interpretation Centre and Knowledge of the Seas Pavilion, are both rich in experience and hard to grapple with all at once. You need to think, wander, look, touch and listen. They use architectural devices of scale, volume and material to generous effect and didn’t contain a moment of love or hate. Perhaps his work holds alarm and generosity at once so he has been forgiven.

In the pursuit of open-mindedness, I asked my fellow tour participants for their thoughts.

Bradley Kerr, who noted he understands the purpose of buildings like this, buildings that create a sense of wonder, in a moment. He considers varied the demographics who experience the place. Children would move through the space with joy, their minds expanded on what a building could be. Other people like to be awed by architecture. He noted, these are buildings that architects hate but people like. An astute observation by our astute observer.

Tiffany Liew, in the voice of a man yelling underwater, exclaimed “I AM BUILDING.” When we calmed our laughter, she noted a preference for quiet architecture that is a backdrop to life. That life is chaotic enough, our buildings don’t need to add to it. Its interfering with the, very interesting, exhibitions as artists struggle to bend their work around the curved walls. Our tour guide explained that the building is curvy as it’s by a river, representing the movement of water. This isn’t enough for Tiffany either.

Our Tour guide, Renato, likes the building for the effect on the city, a “mini Bilbao effect.” MAAT had 900,000 visitors a year pre-pandemic, 50/50 tourists and locals. Renato explained most galleries in Portugal have far smaller visitation numbers and a ratio of 30/70 tourists and locals. The building shouts for attention and brings it from afar. From the perspective of the gallery operator, yes, this is a success.

Sarah Lebner enjoyed the circulation. You slip onto a ramp from the river’s promenade, into the building, and you are greeted by a large oval circulation route that effortlessly moves you around the spaces. Ellen enjoyed the roof plaza and the opportunities it holds for occupation by visitors and locals alike. This this said, she also note is it clearly by a foreign architect. It doesn’t consider the city or context with the grain of place that is evident elsewhere in Lisbon.

MAAT is a foreign object in a very textured city. It holds a divisive moment of fascination. It is a place for tourists and children to play. It attracts visitors to its exhibitions. It is not my cup of tea. Although, the garden on the walk away from the building is lovely.

Beyond the fresco

Day 5

Ellen Buttrose reflects on the tour's second day in Lisbon

I’ve just spent the last hour and three watery coffees drawing out a mind map in an attempt to untangle the many threads of thought covered yesterday. We ping-ponged across Lisbon between six practices covering topics from the inhabitation of rocks, neo-post-modernism, ecologies, competitions and kind but firm advice to get out of architecture now.

At this point we are shattered, not quite at saturation point but the feet and eyes are really struggling to keep up with the incredible pace of this itinerary. Each practice we visited has bent our minds down another brilliant path.

Embaxiada practice visit

What was yesterday’s take away? I keep coming back to a piece of research by Embaxiada, which I felt summarised a pattern of what we were hearing. As we were getting ready to leave their practice yesterday, Nuno Bernardo Griff pulled up a series of slides with a research project their practice had been working on over the past few years to support their clients and contextualise the city before embarking on a new project. The series of maps, diagrams and images focused history of the built environment in Lisbon. Nuno flicked and talked through a series of highly detailed maps illustrating how the city has evolved. The detailed mapping started from the iron age, showing the old town, which was built on, and eventually over, an alluvial river. The town was named Alfama, Arabic for spring. The detailed mapping, included, photos, sun diagrams, a topography map that appeared like an organ, and an impressive series of maps that tracked the growth and spread of the city from the Iron Age to the present time.

Shaping Lisbon over time

Over this trip we have heard again and again about pinpoint precise moments in time that have shaped Lisbon’s history that has directly shaped the language of the city’s architecture. From the Iron Age, the first settlements, changing topographies to the fall of the dictatorship, a rise in “clumsy” modernism, a financial crisis, tsunamis and earthquakes, each have had a direct effect on the city’s built form and the way it is spoken about.

What I heard was: We need to understand where we’ve been in order to understand where we are going

We heard this contextual positioning from every practice we visited yesterday, each practice articulating how their architecture is placed in conversation with its place and history. Aires Mateus’s office was lined with restored 18th-century frescos, regal faces of the past watching over their busy model-making space.

When explaining the concepts articulated in Dodged House, Bureau spoke about the eyes (windows) of remaining closed to the street, to record the inherited state of the building resulting from the financial crisis of the mid-2000s.

Luis Fernandes from Carrilho da Graça Arquitectos spoke of how the ending of the Estado Novo’s dictatorship in the 1970s was integral in defining Portugal’s interpretation of modernism. He directly linked Novo’s extensive nationalistic rebuilding of the cathedrals and historical buildings to Portugal’s robust and severe interpretation of modernism, which has shaped Portugal’s buildings since.

Extra Studio commented on the conversations taking place in Lisbon’s architecture scene today collage and “put a sun on it” iconography – João Caldeira Ferrão, owner of Extra Studio said, and then questioned us intently on how we positioned ourselves in contemporary theory, asking what specific “neo-ism” we fell into – neo-post-modernism, neo critical regionalism, or “neo-med” (Mediterranean).

Antonio Costa Lima talked about how his aim for a rural residential project was to “belong to the context” in camouflaging his architecture into the rural landscape. And for an urban setting, how Lisbon is borne from the activity of the river.

Often the language I heard being used by the practices was describing how the architecture is to not be placed on, but within this context. Sitting both as a part of a lineage, and a piece of the future.

Interesting thoughts for us Australians

Mulling the idea over with Linda Cheng this morning, she eloquently noted the clear line in that can be drawn in a history for a colonising country as opposed to a colonised country. How a linear path can be drawn through Portugal’s history from the Iron Age until now.

I keep thinking about what shape Australia’s line would take. What is our architecture drawing on? How can we generate a clear identity, or do we in fact need to? I’m not sure I have answers for these big questions right now. Another coffee will surely help.

Urban alchemy

Day 4

Tiffany Liew reflects on the tour's first day in Lisbon

Lisbon is a living museum – a city that reveals a rich tapestry of historical and political aspirations through its architecture. Layers of time coexist in the stratum of the city, shaping its character and identity. Today we were guided by a local Portuguese architect Rodrigo Lima to visit about 20 buildings. From the ancient to the modern, it was fascinating to experience an urban setting that carries a deeper sense of place and time. Instead of describing every building, here are a few reflections:

What collective memories do we want to cherish in the fabric of our cities?

The São Jorge Castle Archaeological Centre by Carrilho da Graça Arquitectos invites visitors to experience ruins unearthed during carpark excavations for the castle. This project was phenomenal. Stabilised by Corten sheets, the site reveals structures from the Iron Age, allowing visitors to contemplate the diverse occupation of this site over thousands of years. White, thick floating walls seem to hover over the perimeter of medieval remains. Original limestone and basalt foundations are complemented by honed slabs of pink stone for circulation thresholds. Citronella has been planted in the courtyards to prevent the bees from eating away at the remaining frescoes. What we keep and how we keep or frame existing materials speaks to our values.

Architecture is long-term ephemera and, on scale, contributes to cities in flux

The Thalia Theatre by Gonçalo Byrne and Barbas Lopes is an impressive renovation which demonstrates how architecture can exist as long-term ephemera. Yellow-tinted concrete walls, poured 15 years ago, serve to brace the original 1840s theatre structure. Walking through the sequence of spaces, there is a sense that either approach is defined by completely different characters like a two-headed Janus. At one end there is a white entrance designed by Voigt in the 1930s, lined with limestone and white interiors, inscribed with ‘Here the Deeds of Men Shall Be Punished’ in Latin over the lintel. At the other end is a contemporary glazed addition with chrome metal interiors and yellow concrete floors, built to the original building height datum where ruins could not be retained. Walking through this complex of appended spaces, the characters shifted so quickly like a Chinese face mask changing performer. The sequence of spaces is certainly theatrical and demonstrates how architecture can be reframed as long-term ephemera, a construction that changes over time.

Let’s be more ambitious with our building life spans.

As several countries such as Finland and Denmark transition into mandating maximum carbon footprints for the construction and usage of developments, I couldn’t help but think that the 16th century Casa dos Bicos museum that was extended in the 1980s has far outlived the nominal 50-year life span of a building. Lisbon has been a powerful reminder that adaptive reuse is a powerful strategy to minimise impact and prolong the utility of materials, whilst celebrating cherished buildings.

It’s possible for multiple architects and stylistic periods to “sing in a choir”

Despite being shaped by various architects and periods, Lisbon maintains a cohesive character. In Helsinki, Edwina shared a memorable quote from Playa Architects, alluding to the idea that buildings can sing together more like a choir. Walking through the Alfama and Chiado neighbourhoods, I was impressed by the consistency of dwellings in their architectural language, expression and materials, despite being composited by many different architects over time. Lisbon is one of the oldest cities in the world and demonstrates that multiple architectural styles and revised city plans (in the aftermath of natural disasters) can still resonate with one another. The result is a series of related yet distinct neighbourhood and precinct characters that contribute to an urban setting deeply rooted to its history.

Architecture can be a testament to care, and what we care about

The Church of Sagrado Coração de Jesus, designed by Nuno Teotonio Pereira and Nuno Portas, aimed to be an open and welcoming community space. However, its Brutalist architecture felt oppressive, contrasting with the churches we visited in Helsinki, which embraced natural light and lighter materials. Architecture can express care and reflect the values of the community it serves. Also in today’s walking tour, the Portas do Mar plaza and carpark is a carefully considered public facility. The retention of the original stone steps at the former extent of the water’s edge, reuse of salvaged materials and detailed resolution of the carpark structure to align with the car spaces all revealed an architectural approach with care. The public space provided spaces for people to sit under the shade of trees on sunny hot days, like today. Transport values aside, it is a well-resolved public facility that demonstrates an architecture of care, whilst offering a public space with a view of the sea. More broadly, travelling with Brad, Edwina, Ellen and Sarah, I have been challenged to reflect on what principles and values we should hold as architects in different contexts across Australia. I think Lisbon has helped to galvanise my understanding that urban settings undergo continual transformation and that architecture contributes to this. We also need to think about how we use materials ethically, and material reuse might happily imbue new meanings to existing and available resources. Lisbon’s architecture is a reminder that we can create spaces that honour layers of history, express our values and celebrate local cultures. In several of today’s projects and the footpaths between, the local Portuguese limestone was prominent, with fossils sometimes embedded in the finished surface. I was reminded of David Farrier’s book, In Footprints: In Search of Future Fossils, which contains reflections on our anthropocentric age. After today’s walking tour, I’m reminded that architecture can contribute to the urban project of the city, and that we should consider what fossils we want to leave behind for future generations to come, as clues to what our society values the most.