549. Fernando Távora /// Dr. Fernando Ribeiro da Silva House /// Ofir, Braga, Portugal /// 1957-58

OfHouses guest curated by Pedro Dionísio (Elara Fritzenwalden): HYPERMINIMAL #72 When it is finished

«We fell no emptiness when we finish a work. Only specific names disappear, the events we have experienced; the anecdotes, the memories. The bitter arguments. The wise decisions and the satisfactions. The only thing that remains is there, in front of us.

A work of architecture, whichever work, is neither past nor future, only present.

It is constantly brought to life by use. This space is new and different each time someone make use of it. With the impressions it generates, its efficient daily use, the sounds bouncing off the walls, the changes of color at different hours of the day.

Architecture is the heritage of the collective. It is an anonymous collective exercise. The ideas which construct it are our exclusive personal patrimony. The private obsessions, the silent responsibility and the personal decisions are our only individual moments.

But they are no longer there. We get lost in the materials, in the construction. Until the moment our names disappear we can not feel free in the act of creation to face the next project. Architecture means unseen authors. The names are only momentarily interesting. The critics only remember the anecdotes.

What do we feel when we pass buildings that now make us anonymous in their presence, because of the distance in time or with their owners?»

(Photos: © Rui Moraes de Sousa. Source: “Casa de ferias em Ofir”, Lisbon: Editorial Blau, 1992. Text: Federico Soriano in “100 Hipermínimos 100 Hyperminimals”, Madrid: Lampreave, 2009.)