With the release of the film “The Shape of Light” featuring the company Panzeri, Isplora inaugurates ArchiElements, the new film format that gives voice to the elements of architecture, an educational narration for architects dedicated to businesses, exploring projects and products, innovation and research.
In this regard, Isplora’s editorial staff met Maurizio De Caro, cultural manager for Panzeri, architect, writer and researcher.
An opportunity to talk about shared projects and collaborations around the theme of contemporary design, experimentation through and on architecture.
Maurizio De Caro, "Mi senti? Trattato sull'architettura come comunicazione umana"I: I would start from your latest research work, Mi senti? [Can you hear me?], “a treatise on architecture as human communication”, an itinerary on the profession of architecture. In the body of the text you make a series of considerations, through actions-thoughts, on the movements that lead you to "I am". So, who is Maurizio De Caro?
MDC: I am… with this short aphorism I narrate the concept of space. “I am space”, because the projection, production, visualization of stereometry which is conventionally called architecture is an extremely solitary, personal fact.
Neither I nor you have the same perception of what we’re seeing, “no one will ever be able to do this” isn’t only a philosophical concept, reality doesn’t exist, only interpretation, only our projection.
We project an inner nature we have deeply consolidated, made up of all the dust that has accumulated. You know your grandmother's dresser? All this dust has accumulated on the dresser and your grandmother keeps it instead of dusting it off.
We are the language we express, we are the word we are capable of saying, but above all the word we are unable to say.
We are the superimposition of all we’ve been, the places we’ve seen, the women we’ve loved, children, brothers, fathers and mothers. It isn’t true that all this hasn’t remained in us and when we express ourselves in architecture it isn’t the pencil that speaks, but the memory, experience.
I: Memory, the past and the pre-existing, as elements that are recorded and geographies that remain impressed. What experience do you carry with you?
MDC: I have no experience because I have crossed many disciplines without ever choosing one completely. This is the difference between a researcher in the field of architectural criticism and a “pure” architect. I am convinced that other disciplines contaminate all the rest and you can’t be exempt from what has contaminated you, even language is contaminated.
I: Which were the most important moments, places and people in this contamination process?
MDC: First of all, clearly the experience at the Architectural Association (AA) in London represents a crucial moment, an unrivalled institution in world education. A school linked to the dissolution of architecture, in short, a contradiction in terms, a school that formed architects who were opposed to architecture, to the process of building architecture, such as Rem Koolhaas.
I’m a man of this time, who works in this time, and I believe the substantial difference between a certain type of research and the undifferentiated squalor of architecture is that research is contemporary, everything else is modern.
However, research, doing research was lost, contemporary society struggles a lot in doing research, because culture is hard work, writing, research, commitment.
What I would like to build with Isplora goes in this exact arduous direction of research.
I: You talked about this recently in an interview at the Listone Giordano Arena space in Milan with Alexandro De Martino, the director of Isplora ...
So Isplora as a partner to do research, to continue experimenting?
MDC: When I met Alexandro I immediately understood what direction he wanted to go in, and I realized we could go part of the way together.
Isplora is carrying out important research on the project, without forgetting the quality of your film productions.
“The shape of light” is an example, there was already a first hypothesis of collaboration.
I: We could say "Isplora meets Maurizio De Caro": a dialectical meeting, to build a series of exchanges, collaborations, “processes of overwriting” as we said before ...
MDC: Isplora's activity is commendable, it needs to be supported, in turn told.
And I'm a screenwriter! Right now I feel like starting a collaboration with Isplora, both in terms of films and events, imagining an important format, I’d dare say unbeatable! (smiling)
I am sure of it, I’ll tell you frankly.
I: Architecture as a synthesis between our two roads, as a form of communication and narration ...
There is a whole world! There is a huge job to do!
There are architects, companies and businesses to involve in our project, intertwining requests and stories, providing professional development, focusing on the quality and culture of the project.
Maurizio de Caro, Professor of Theory and Aesthetics of Design, LABA, Brescia
