Tower of Temporality
Campo San Polo,Venice, Italy
2017 - TU Delft Msc1
Selected Work of Annual Book - ARGUS
The Venetian Campo project aims to explore how a public building intervenes in a Venetian campo as a way to build the connection between past and present. It discusses the responsive solution to its urban landscape in both cultural and physical forms through a recurring theme of Venice – the festive city. To capture this theme, we adopt various methods to represent the Venetian Genius Loci, including the trials of architectural expressions in symmetrical or asymmetrical forms, local materialization as well as structures.
To me, Venice expresses its glory by the festive moments when the historic rituals are periodically held and the traces of subsequent events has evolved into new urban conventions. “Temporality” describes the ephemeral beauty which is precisely the scenario of festivity. It depicts just like what happens in Campo San Polo during carnivals, ice skating or film festival: demountable stages are quickly assembled; countless stalls pop up within hours; streets are flooded with crowds; multiple voices emit from the balconies. Then the din gradually dies down as the festival ends, which makes a big contrast with the scene during normal days when the compo is quite empty. The value of “temporality” becomes self-evident. The festive Campo becomes periodic, strengthen by the notion of temporality, by the ephemeral form that invites one to forget architecture.