Vertical Studio Recycling the Incompiuto Siciliano Tutors: Federico Wulff, Melina Guirnaldos Guest Tutors: Enric Llorach (Barcelona), Francesco Messina (Reggio Calabria)
http://www.incompiutosiciliano.org/incompiuto-siciliano http://www.unfinished-italy.com/ http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xieblf_unfinished-italy_shortfilms http://www.comune.giarre.ct.it/informazioni/comunicati-stampa/default.aspx?cs=7617 http://www.archinfo.it/parco-archeologico-dell-incompiuto-siciliano/0,1254,53_ART_198227,00.html
EMUVE European research project focuses on the existing voids produced by current shrinking cities at Euro-Mediterranean coastline. These cities are now in many cases transformed in empty landscapes stopped by present economic crisis. These voids are not only understood as the spaces that were not developed, but also as half-built speculative developments and Infrastructures stopped by the crisis. The present Vertical Studio, named RecyclingtheIncompiutoSiciliano (UnfinishedSicilian) will be a teaching activity of our European Project, which will involve students of the WSA and the School of Architecture of Reggio-Calabria (Italy) in the search for recycling strategies for these post-crisis future ruinsin Sicily. The Incompiuti Siciliani are the Unfinished infrastructures that were stopped by the lack of public investment in Sicily, which at the present appear as the monuments of the current economic crisis as well as a symbol of political power and artistic sensitivity. Sicilyhas 160of the total of these 350monumentsto wastagein Italy, unfinished structuresthat give name toa new architectural style baptized Incompiuto Siciliano. Ifeach styleinterpretshis time,these giantand useless sculpturesarethe metaphor ofthe decades ofthe urban development boom.They appear as places of a collective memory, ruins that were bornfrom the unionbetweenthe exuberantcreativity of Sicily and the ancestraloratoryandpoliticsofits inhabitants.The naturealso establishes a dialectic relation withthese unfinished works,reclaimingandredefining thelandscapeof the place. Here the tension betweenform and functionis solved. The lack of use transforms these constructions in worksof art. They are not onlyworks ofarchitecturebutthe nerve endingsof an articulated and complex organism. The aim of this Vertical Studio is to analyse and develop recycling strategies for one of the most interesting cases of Incompiuti Siciliani: the town of Giarre in Catania. Only in this site, there are seven unfinished structures to be activated: A sports center, two swimming pools, an elder people center, a Polo field, a hospital and a park. Looking carefully to the informal strategies followed by people to recycle these kind of structures, the students have to develop a new use for theseabandoned spaces. In the first week, we will organise a study trip with the students of WSA to Sicily, where we will meet the students of the school of architecture of Reggio Calabria. Together, we will discover the intervention site, and we will explore the possibilities of activation of these abandoned structures. During our stay in Giarre in the first week of the studio, the students have to analyse and select which unfinished building they are interested in, and give reasons for their election through a deep analysis of the site. Then, they will develop a recycling strategy in it, based on art intervention and informality strategies, in collaboration with the students of Reggio Calabria. In the second week of the vertical studioat our return to Cardiff,
we will finish the projects, the models and the representation strategies for the final exhibition. The aim of this vertical studio is to increase the awareness of the students in developing activation strategies for economic crisis landscapes with low cost and flexible strategies.