Curator: Michal Škoda, Michaela Benešová
Admission: free
Aires Mateus - Archive - Invitation to the Exhibition at DUČB
Curators: Michal Škoda, Michaela Benešová
Admission: free
This year's last exhibition dedicated to architecture presents the Lisbon practice of Aires Mateus, led by brothers Manuel and Francisco Aires Mateus.
The most important moment of Aires Mateus’s unique work is the relationship between emptiness and fullness. Their creations are characterized by a number of distinct elements, always with an emphasis on detail, featuring present cleanliness and simplicity of shapes, where solid forms meet the emptiness that itself becomes space. They pay great attention to the choice of materials, with white color dominating their buildings, a typical feature being the articulation of space and also how they achieve "sensitive notches" into the mass of very impressive /functional/ expression. The resulting openings often become a sort of "gateway" for incoming light.
The Aires Mateus studio was founded in Lisbon in 1988 by brothers Manuel (1963) and Francisco (1964) Aires Mateus. Both studied at the Faculty of Architecture at the Technical University of Lisbon, graduating in 1986 and 1987, respectively. The quality of their work has brought both brothers not only significantly increasing interest in their creations but also offers for teaching positions, for example at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard or at the Accademia di Architettura in Swiss Mendrisio. They have numerous realizations behind them, accompanied by a whole range of prestigious awards.
Aires Mateus, through their constant search and experimentation with an intentional timelessness, create a narrative that can be taken as their perspective on the world. Using light and mass, they strive to innovate their creations in a very sensitive, one might say poetic, manner. They manage the communication with the past both in terms of integrating their new projects within the contexts of places and in the case of renovations and extensions. Although the buildings often have a sculptural nature, they are always based on the elegance of clean shapes and natural functionality. They typically show respect for the landscape and place, as well as the ability to maintain "opposites" in a state of shared existence. In natural harmony, for example, monumentalism versus human scale, boldness and tranquility or abstraction with robustness coexist.
One of the main characteristics attributed to architecture is beauty. They state: "Beauty appears as an added value of the architect and is, in fact, the reason why people commission our work…”
It should be noted that in recent years, beauty has rather become a trigger for criticism directed at architects. However, the culprits must be sought among those architects who have banalized it through excessive aestheticization of the appearance of buildings and space to cover a lack of content, or have abused it as a synonym for superficiality. Beauty, in the case of Aires Mateus, is not some added layer of good taste; it carries the ability to capture and express human desires within itself. Their search for beauty is rooted in ancient archetypes, their beauty transcends banality and, in its silence, becomes an unspeakable certainty. It can be perceived in the words of Finnish architect Erik Bryggman: "Beauty is not a mysterious veil thrown over a building, but a logical result of everything being in its place.”
The exhibition that Aires Mateus presents in České Budějovice is specially prepared for the local space and is a certain insight into their creations, approach to architecture, and way of thinking. They themselves state about the project Archive: "Freud speculates that the organization of memory is not unlike the process of engraving or a chalkboard, which we write on and erase, while always leaving traces. This collection of engraved traces then itself represents an archive. The project grows from a seed, from a confrontation with a problem. It is born without a past, or rather without a definite past – it creates its own. The project, with its realization, becomes a new trace, a new experience of itself and its flow. A trace whose lasting memory is its own course. The organization of the memory of these traces evokes relationships with architectural works, does not seek chronological, typological, or geographical organization – it rather leaves traces in the air, which in one way or another help reflections of memories emerge in the future problem that the creator will face.”
Admission: free
This year's last exhibition dedicated to architecture presents the Lisbon practice of Aires Mateus, led by brothers Manuel and Francisco Aires Mateus.
The most important moment of Aires Mateus’s unique work is the relationship between emptiness and fullness. Their creations are characterized by a number of distinct elements, always with an emphasis on detail, featuring present cleanliness and simplicity of shapes, where solid forms meet the emptiness that itself becomes space. They pay great attention to the choice of materials, with white color dominating their buildings, a typical feature being the articulation of space and also how they achieve "sensitive notches" into the mass of very impressive /functional/ expression. The resulting openings often become a sort of "gateway" for incoming light.
The Aires Mateus studio was founded in Lisbon in 1988 by brothers Manuel (1963) and Francisco (1964) Aires Mateus. Both studied at the Faculty of Architecture at the Technical University of Lisbon, graduating in 1986 and 1987, respectively. The quality of their work has brought both brothers not only significantly increasing interest in their creations but also offers for teaching positions, for example at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard or at the Accademia di Architettura in Swiss Mendrisio. They have numerous realizations behind them, accompanied by a whole range of prestigious awards.
Aires Mateus, through their constant search and experimentation with an intentional timelessness, create a narrative that can be taken as their perspective on the world. Using light and mass, they strive to innovate their creations in a very sensitive, one might say poetic, manner. They manage the communication with the past both in terms of integrating their new projects within the contexts of places and in the case of renovations and extensions. Although the buildings often have a sculptural nature, they are always based on the elegance of clean shapes and natural functionality. They typically show respect for the landscape and place, as well as the ability to maintain "opposites" in a state of shared existence. In natural harmony, for example, monumentalism versus human scale, boldness and tranquility or abstraction with robustness coexist.
One of the main characteristics attributed to architecture is beauty. They state: "Beauty appears as an added value of the architect and is, in fact, the reason why people commission our work…”
It should be noted that in recent years, beauty has rather become a trigger for criticism directed at architects. However, the culprits must be sought among those architects who have banalized it through excessive aestheticization of the appearance of buildings and space to cover a lack of content, or have abused it as a synonym for superficiality. Beauty, in the case of Aires Mateus, is not some added layer of good taste; it carries the ability to capture and express human desires within itself. Their search for beauty is rooted in ancient archetypes, their beauty transcends banality and, in its silence, becomes an unspeakable certainty. It can be perceived in the words of Finnish architect Erik Bryggman: "Beauty is not a mysterious veil thrown over a building, but a logical result of everything being in its place.”
The exhibition that Aires Mateus presents in České Budějovice is specially prepared for the local space and is a certain insight into their creations, approach to architecture, and way of thinking. They themselves state about the project Archive: "Freud speculates that the organization of memory is not unlike the process of engraving or a chalkboard, which we write on and erase, while always leaving traces. This collection of engraved traces then itself represents an archive. The project grows from a seed, from a confrontation with a problem. It is born without a past, or rather without a definite past – it creates its own. The project, with its realization, becomes a new trace, a new experience of itself and its flow. A trace whose lasting memory is its own course. The organization of the memory of these traces evokes relationships with architectural works, does not seek chronological, typological, or geographical organization – it rather leaves traces in the air, which in one way or another help reflections of memories emerge in the future problem that the creator will face.”
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