The exhibition Lisbon Acts was produced by the Lisbon Architecture Triennale and is on display at the OVNI film festival in Nice. Before that, it traveled to Rijeka, Croatia, from 28 May to 7 June 2019. It was exhibited for the first time at BINA - International Architecture Week of Belgrade, on 10 May 2018, in this celebration of the decade of existence.

The last ten years in the city of Lisbon. That was our starting point. We chose six architecture studios that have established their companies in Lisbon during that period of time: Aspa, Barbas Lopes, Can Ran, Miguel Marcelino, PLCO and Site Specific. And we picked a significant first work, built in the city. We asked the architects for drawings without words, drawings of these projects, which you can see throughout this exhibition. 

A gigantic tower block, a bar in a garden, an intervention on a river boat station, a meditation centre, a church and a private apartment – we decided to lend this diverse selection of architectural works to the fictional world of stories, and so, in this exhibition you can also read the stories of writer Patrícia Portela in the book Floraennui, you can see Catarina Botelho’s photographs, Filomena Project, and watch Pedro Cabeleira’s film, Filomena. 

The Lisbon Architecture Triennale (2007-2018) was also born ten years ago, and we have testified that our ancient city has been the stage for a process of constant ideological, social, economic and built evolution. The city shapes our lives and the city is shaped by our lives: built spaces do not exist except for the people who inhabit them, and they accumulate meaning and significance in an active, ephemeral call-and-response with the rich moments of our own experiences. This exhibition shows different fictional views in response to these experiences, at the same time that architects go on shaping our city, weaving its fabric as we live in it.

Lisbon acts. Act out with us.

9th of April Garden Bar, 2016
Aspa

This garden has a belvedere with a panoramic view over the Tagus river and is surrounded by numerous buildings of historical significance to Lisbon. It appears as a promontory in a green space filled with tradition, open to the river and its ships, and with a stunning view to the right bank of the Tagus. Placed on the roofscape of an existing building which anchors the change in level between the garden and the lower plane of the 24th of July Avenue, this bar/terrace is built as a single storey structure. Its ephemeral character, lightness of materials, transparency, permeability and reflection promotes and preserves existing views, ensuring that the structure does not become an obstacle.

Architecture: José Maria Cumbre + Nuno Sousa Caetano
Collaboration: Carolina C. Freire
Engineering: Energia Técnica, PRPC Engenheiros
Contractor: Salvaria, Lda
Area: 308.8 m2
Photo: Fernando Guerra – FG+SG

Biography: Aspa

José Maria Cumbre (Lisbon, 1980). Attended the Basque Country University in San Sebastian through the Erasmus programme. Graduated in Architecture at the Lisbon Lusíada University in 2003. He was an intern and collaborator at the Matos Gameiro + Carlos Crespo Architects Studio in 2004 and 2005. In 2006, he created the aspa studio with Nuno Sousa Caetano.

Nuno Sousa Caetano (Lisbon, 1978). Graduated in Architecture at the Lisbon Lusíada University in 2003. Collaborator at the Trabalhos Forçados studio in 2000 and 2001. He did an internship and collaborated at the Duarte Ramirez + Pedro Caetano de Carvalho Architects studio from 2001 to 2005. In 2006, he created the aspa studio with José Maria Cumbre.

FPM41, 2018
Barbas Lopes Arquitectos

In 2015, Barbas Lopes were awarded the project for an office building and its surrounding areas in the business centre of Lisbon. Their proposal was to design a timeless building, clear and flexible enough to face any kind of eventualities, which are quite common at this scale. Constructive rationality, layout flexibility, environmental comfort and good energy performance were central aspects of the project. Despite being private as a mission, an office building has a strong public expression. This awareness was the key for the design of the building and its surrounding landscape, such as the custom made modular facade, the location of the double height lobby, the flat public square or the hybridisation of private and public properties. 

Client: Edifício 41
Architecture: Patrícia Barbas, Diogo Lopes
Collaborators: Catarina Sousa, Guillaume Guisan, Guilherme Oliveira, Gonçalo Soares, Laurianne Ferreira, Margarida Esteves, Ricardo Lima, Sérgio Catumba, Tania Depallens, Vítor Sá
Landscape Architecture: HAHA Arquitectura Paisagista
 Engineering: JSJ and EACE
Contractor: Mota-Engil/Casais
Area: 22.500 m2
Photo: Nuno Cera

Biography: Barbas Lopes Arquitectos

This studio established their practice in 2006. Realised projects or under development include public and private buildings, single-family housing, exhibition designs, and interiors. The practice is also engaged in collaborations with architects such as Peter Märkli, Promontório Architects, Manuel Aires Mateus and Gonçalo Byrne. Their work was nominated for Icon Awards 2012, Designs of the Year 2013 and Mies van der Rohe 2013. They were Azrieli Visiting Critics in Residence at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada.

Patrícia Barbas (n.1971, Luanda). Graduated in Architecture at FAUTL, Lisbon. Collaborated with Aires Mateus, João Pedro Falcão de Campos and Atelier Pedro Silva Dias (Design). Project coordinator for Gonçalo Byrne (1998-2000) and Promontório Architects in Salvador da Bahia, Brazil (2005-2006). Guest Professor at Carleton University, Ottawa (2013, 2015-2016). Jury member of FAD Awards 2016.

Diogo Lopes (Lisbon, 1972-2016). Graduated in Architecture at FAUTL, Lisbon. Doctorate from ETH Zurich. Guest Professor at Carleton University, Ottawa (2013, 2015-2016) and DARQ.FCTUC (2011-2013). He was Director of the magazine Prototypo, Director and Chief Curator with André Tavares of JA-Jornal dos Arquitectos and Lisbon Architecture Triennale 2016. His publications include Cimêncio (Fenda Edições, 2001) with Nuno Cera and the book Melancholy and Architecture: On Aldo Rossi (Park Books, 2015). Posthumously, it was published the Portuguese version of the book (Orfeu Negro, 2016) and awarded with the second prize of AICA 2016.

Sea Level, 2011
Can Ran

Twenty shades of tiles that range from white, to blue, to black. The chromatic effect of this intervention in ceramics placed on the ceiling and the columns of the atrium at the South and Southeast Station is given by this variation of colours, which merges with the architecture at the same time highlighting it and giving it emphasis. The drawing created by the tiles reminds us of sea waves, with its circular shapes that come from the columns. From this connection and reflection a virtual space is born, in which the passage of people and the variation of the light is an integral part of the work that is always in a continuous interaction and mutation.

Client: Metropolitano de Lisboa
Intervention: Catarina Almada Negreiros and Rita Almada Negreiros
Architecture: Atelier Daciano da Costa
Covered Area: 480m2
Photo: Daniel Blaufuks

Biography: Can Ran Arquitectura

“The scale and scope of our projects are diverse. From housing to architecture renovation, from public and private facilities to public space, from lightning to ceramic tiles design. All our works have been developed through the exploration of similar methodological frameworks and creative process, which challenge multiple design investigations to seek for new solutions and to produce spatial and architectural outcomes as result of multidisciplinary synthesis.”

Catarina Almada Negreiros and Rita Almada Negreiros founded Ateliers de Santa Catarina in 2000. Ateliers de Santa Catarina are a Lisbon based creative hub that promotes active interdisciplinary participation between architects, artists and designers.

Catarina Almada Negreiros (CAN). Grad.Dipl.Arch. FAUTL, Portugal, 1996. MARCH II, GSD, Harvard, U.S.A., 2002. Master in Communication and Art, UNL, Portugal, 2011. Intern at Architect at MUF:ART/ARCHITECTURE, London, 1997-99. 

Rita Almada Negreiros (RAN). Grad.Dipl.Arch.. Lusíada University, Lisbon, 1994. Intern at Architect at Wilmotte (Paris) 1994-97. Intern at Architect at BCQ Arquitectes (Barcelona) 1997-98. Intern at Architect at Jordi Castel (Barcelona), 1998-99. 

Telheiras Apartment, 2016
Miguel Marcelino

This apartment, built in the 80s, had problems that are typical most Portuguese domestic architecture of the second half of the 20th century: low ceilings throughout the house, subdivided spaces, long narrow kitchens, winding corridors and numerous protrusions of pillars and beams that reveal an unresolved conflict between structure and architecture. The intervention sought to reduce the usual sectioning between kitchen, hall, corridors and living room, creating a fluid space with large visual fields and richer possibilities of appropriation. Protruding structural elements of beams and pillars will have their concrete re-exposed, without shame, and together with the new wooden elements will contribute to a new atmosphere, reigniting the qualities and pleasure of living in an apartment, in a city.

Architecture: Miguel Marcelino
Manufacturers: Artemide, Flos, blum, JNF, Osvaldo Matos SA, Projecto Mosaico
Area: 115.0 m2
Photo: Miguel Marcelino Archive

Biography: Miguel Marcelino

Miguel Marcelino (Portugal, 1981), architect (UAL, 2005), lives and works in Lisbon. Studied music from 1993 to 1998 at the Gregorian Institute of Lisbon. Worked with Herzog & de Meuron (Switzerland, 2003/04) and Bonell & Gil (Spain, 2005/07), before establishing his own office in 2008, winning on that year his first open competition. In 2014, he is invited to join the official Portuguese representation at the Venice Architecture Biennale. In 2015, he publishes “Extrospection”, a personal journey through ten timeless themes in architecture. Miguel Marcelino's built work includes the Three Courtyards House (2012), House on a Warehouse (2012), Fonte de Angeão School (2014) and the Museum of Mechanical Music (2016).

 

Meditation & Yoga Centre, 2013
PLCO Arquitectos

Hidden away in a cellar space in very nondescript area on the western edge of Lisbon lies a space made for meditation. Two doors mark the different programmes of the building in question: one provides private access to the living quarters; the other opens onto a succession of spaces at different levels on a descending course that ends on a veranda overlooking Monsanto forest park – the Meditation Centre. Lighting is a decisive element in creating the various interior ambiences and erasing the boundary between interior and exterior. The meditation space allows the exterior landscape and the half-shade of the interior spaces to coexist in a shared place.

Client: Associação Upaya
Architecture: Pedro Oliveira
Collaborators: Carolina Fernandes, Bernardo Pereira Coutinho
Engineering: PRPC Engenheiros, FTD, Natural Works, Blueorizon, Energia Técnica, Campo de Água
Construction: Paviana Construções
Covered Area: 550m2
Photo: Fábio Silva

Biography: PLCO Arquitectos

Studio founded in 2009 in Lisbon by Pedro Lagrifa Oliveira, that develops works in several scales and programs, public and private, always crossing subjects, anchored in different sources of knowledge that are summoned depending on specificities of each project. PLCO often collaborates with artist Gilberto Reis, with whom he shares a special bond concerning a way of thinking and acting over reality. Oliveira tries to find for each project the fairest way to inhabit a place, in the relationship it establishes – or not – with the space where it’s built. It is through building and its expression that architecture materializes and reveals itself.

Divine Master Chapel, 2015
site specific arquitectura

The project brief for this chapel, or small church, built in a particular house for particular people – the brotherhood of Instituto Missionário Pio Sociedade de São Paulo, was based on principles that don’t necessarily concur. It should be the central area for a house of many homes; a space for prayer and for communication; a place of intimacy as well as assembly. The project reuses the existing building and aims to provide it with a new meaning. This is done through a process of austere and rigorous designing, which relies on the simplicity of volumes, natural lighting and inherent qualities of proposed materials. The concrete structure is retained, bare and imperfect but suitable nevertheless, and somehow up-lifted by the new context. 

Client: Instituto Missionário Pia Sociedade São Paulo
Architecture: Patrícia Marques and João Paulo Costa
Collaborator: Simão Botelho
Art work: Bartolomeu de Gusmão
Communication: P-06 Atelier
Consultants: Paulo Pires do Vale and Nuno Gusmão
Construction: Fuste - Construções e Imobiliária, S.A.
Photo: do mal o menos (Eduardo Nascimento and João Fôja)

Biography: Site Specific Arquitectura

Patrícia Marques (n.1975, Lisboa)
Graduated in architecture at Faculdade de Arquitectura of Universidade Técnica de Lisboa (1999) and master in Curatorial Studies (thesis “Architecture on display”) by Faculdade de Belas Artes da Universidade de Lisboa (2009). As a student, attended École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Paris La Villette (1998) with an Erasmus scholarship and won the prize - Arquitectura Jov’Arte 97- of the Loures City Hall. Begun the professional activity in 1999, in the Dutch office De Zwarte Hond, in Rotterdam and in 2000 starts the collaboration with Aires Mateus e Associados, in Lisbon. In 2009, starts working as free lancer with several collaborations with other architects, engineers, landscape architects, designers and artists. In 2010 founds the site specific - arquitectura, Lda that keeps the same principles of inter disciplinary collaborations and where has developed projects in different working areas. Coordinator of Lisboa Open House in 2012 and 2013, programmed by Lisbon Architectural Trienal. Winner of FAD award 2015 - interiors with S. Paulo Library, Loures.

J. Paulo Costa (n.1973, Lisboa) 1993/4 AR.CO Centro de Arte e Comunicação Visual - architectural design i /ii 1993/98 Graduated by Faculdade de Arquitectura da Universidade Técnica de Lisboa 1999 Academic scholarship in Kees Christiansen Architects and Planners office in Rotterdam, Netherlands 1999/2000 Collaboration in OMA - Office for Metropolitan Architecture in Rotterdam, Netherlands 2000 Collaboration for a competition with Inês lobo/Pedro Domingos + Ricardo Bak Gordon/Carlos Vilela, Lisboa 2000/2012 Collaboration with João Luis Carrilho da Graça, as team leader 2012/- phd in Architecture - Interior - Novos Territórios, of Universidade de Évora ( in progress). 2015 Winner of FAD award 2015 - interiors with S. Paulo Library, Loures 2012 Associated of the Site Specific - Arquitectura, lda 2015 Winner of FAD award 2015 - interiors with S. Paulo Library, Loures.

Floraennui, short stories, 1–66pp. 2018 Patrícia Portela

Women that cross the river, women that clean, women that report the news, women that take care of our garbage. They are many and maybe they are all of us. Portela took some of the characters she wrote for her monthly chronicle at the Letras newspaper, Na hora de comer o treinador [time to eat the coach] and imagined them in the buildings we proposed, in our time. The title of these stories is taken from a nineteenth century technical term, explained in the beginning of this book. If you haven’t yet, go to the beginning and start reading. 

Biography: Patrícia Portela

Portela is a writer and performance maker born in 1974, living between Belgium and Portugal. She studied set and costume design in Lisbon and in Utrecht, film in Ebeltoft, Denmark, and Philosophy in Leuven, Belgium. Since 2003 she has worked on her own performances and installations in collaboration with international artists. She has achieved national and international recognition for her unusual work and is considered one of the most daring artists and innovative writers of her generation. She won the Revelation Prize in 1994 for her creative work in performance and cinema, the Prize Teatro na Década for T5 in 1999, the Gulbenkian Foundation Prize Madalena de Azeredo Perdigão for the performance Flatland I in 2004 and was one of the 5 finalists of the Sonae Media Art Prize 2015 with her installation Parasomnia, amongst other prizes. She has been invited to participate in the prestigious International Writing Program (IWP) at the University of Iowa in 2013, and was the first literary resident in Berlin in 2016. She is the author of several novels and short stories, and is a chronicle writer for the prestigious Jornal de Letras and coffeepaste online since 2017. 

Filomena, short film, 4:3, 14’, 2018 Pedro Cabeleira

This short film starts early in the morning and accompanies housekeeper Filomena during a day that promises to be just another boring day at work. But then after having lunch with a special someone and an afternoon spent cleaning with Vanessa, a chatty young colleague, we learn that underneath the rut is hidden a romantic that does not take love for granted. During the day, Filomena goes through six very different spaces that seem to put into perspective her inner dilemmas.

Director: Pedro Cabeleira Writers: Pedro Cabeleira, Diogo S. Figueira With: Sandra Hung (Filomena), António Simão (António), Maria Cardetas Melo (Vanessa), Catarina Sousa (architect), Eugénio Madeira (engineer), Sérgio Coragem (waiter), Maria João Castelo Branco and Raul Carvalho (Le Chat couple), Dora Carregosa and Maria João Pimentel (Upaya clients), Ana Valentim (meditator) Cinematographer: Leonor Teles Cinematography assistants and Electricians/machinists: Manuel Braga, André Costa Sound capture and post-production: Tiago Raposinho Set design and wardrobe: Sara Loureiro Editing: Pedro Cabeleira Post-production cinematography: Rita Lamas Set photography: Catarina Botelho Producers: Trienal de Arquitectura de Lisboa, Pedro Cabeleira Production director: Diogo S. Figueira Production assistant: Paulo Carmo Catering: Joana Rute Carmo

Biography: Pedro Cabeleira

Born in 1992 in Portugal, graduated in directing from Lisbon Theatre and Film School where he shots his medium-format film, “Estranhamento” (2013). After graduating, he found “Videolotion”, a production company, with Joana Peralta and Marta Ribeiro. “Verão Danado” (2017) is his first feature film.

Filomena Project, photographic series (6), 2018 Catarina Botelho

In what way do our bodies occupy a space, a place, architecture? What does it mean to film fiction? Or just to film? Who is observing and who is observed? During three days of shooting, I accompanied a team of technicians and actors, through six buildings, six sets. In a dual game between showing and hiding, these places were occupied during some hours by the bodies that were filming and the technical material; by the bodies that were filmed and the objects that were necessary for fiction.

Biography: Catarina Botelho

Graduated in painting from Faculdade de Belas Artes de Lisboa in 2004. In 2007 did the advanced photography course of Ar.Co. Has attended the photography course of Gulbenkian’s Creativity and Artistic Creation Programme in 2008. As exhibit her work since 2005. In 2007, wins the Bes Revelação Prize, exhibiting her work at Fundação de Serralves, Oporto. In that same year presents her first solo show at Galeria Modulo, Lisbon. In 2009, presents Useful Days at Rua Anchieta 31, in Lisbon. In 2010 is selected for Plat(T)form 10 at the Winterthur Museum and is an artist in residency at Budapest Gallery in Budapest/Cml. In 2011 is nominated for the EDP New Artist Prize and in 2012 for the European Photo Exhibition Award, to be held at Haus der Photographie em Hamburg. Also in 2012 wins the Elba Benitez Gallery Open Call for PhotoEspaña. In 2013, is one of the artists in residency at FAAP, São Paulo.