Concéntrico Pavilion
Cássio Sauer, Elisa T. Martins [sauermartins] + Mauricio Méndez
Plaza Escuelas Trevijano
In line with the theme of the festival, the pavilion proposes a reflection on the place, the urban, the city and the specific and challenging moment we live in.
The pavilion, as a landmark of the festival, recognises the square, the public facilities, the sculpture and proposes an intervention related to this specific context.
Its geometric forms are two pieces that complement each other: a bar and a circle.
The circle appears as the meeting point par excellence, in this case, configuring a new space of centrality – with the tree in the middle -, the circular element does not touch the ground, it rises and floats above the square.
The bar, in turn, intercepts and supports the circle generating an opening, and serves as a large vertical surface for exhibitions and festival signage.
At the same time, the linear plan of the bar creates a backdrop for the sculpture of the marchers.
The scale of the pavilion makes it possible to shelter and welcome the public as a starting point for the festival’s routes and activities and can serve as a support for presentations, meetings or talks. It can also be used as an atrium for access to the various buildings in the surrounding area.
By involving the square, it provokes the rediscovery of urban relations, an invitation to walk through the square and the installation.
A narration of paths, of a historical memory and of new perspectives.
The fragile and at the same time monumental expression of the proposal finds in a simple design the possibility of demarcating the space, a sign of transformation and powerful and ephemeral movement.
The proposal is also a manifestation of duality expressed by the constant proposition of contrasts: instability and equilibrium, the contemporary and the historical, the wall that limits and the circle that receives, the space that is both interior and exterior, the open and the closed.
A site-specific installation which, through two very simple gestures, completely transforms the experimentation of this urban space.
Wood as the only material in the intervention appears in a study of its versatility and structural quality.
The circle formed by veneers with angular cuts pressed by ribbons is supported on one side by the bar and on the other by a stone. They identify the weight and lightness of modern times.
The black paint treatment unifies the intervention and minimises the texture of the wood, focusing on the clarity of the shapes and spaces of the pavilion.
Cássio Sauer, Elisa T. Martins [sauermartins] + Mauricio Méndez
sauermartins is an architectural studio founded by Cássio Sauer and Elisa T Martins, based in Porto Alegre, Brazil, working on different scales and programmes, seeking architecture as an instrument capable of transforming realities. It participated in the 16th. In 2018, with works exhibited in the y.a.l.a. exhibition ‘young architects in latin america’ and in the Brazilian pavilion, in the exhibition ‘muros de ar’. in 2019, it received the ‘exploraciones proyectuales’ award at the biennial of buenos aires and distinguished itself as one of the ten finalists of the ‘prémio debút’ of the Lisbon architecture triennial.
They work simultaneously in the professional and academic spheres, with experiences that complement each other, in a quest to bring theory and practice closer together.
Mauricio Méndez is an architect from the Universidad Católica Boliviana San Pablo (ucb/2017), he was part of the clea (latin american coordinator of architecture students (2015/2017) and was recognised as the best undergraduate project in the 13th biennial of Bolivian architecture (2017). He completed the postgraduate course on rethinking modernity (2020) and is currently studying for a master’s degree in project research oriented towards housing (mipov), both at the university of buenos aires fadu uba. He was awarded the experimental project prize at the international architecture biennial of buenos aires ba 15 with the group project uraycamuy (2015), was an exhibitor and critic at the vii international architecture biennial of santa cruz (2020), is part of the kaiser arquitectura studio and the pachakuti architecture workshop.