Abstraction that is lost in nature. Liquid Pavilion by depA Architects

The Portuguese architecture practice based in Porto, depA Architects, has completed "Liquid Pavilion" in the grounds of Fundação de Serralves designed by Álvaro Siza Vieira. This cultural institution, the most visited museum in Portugal, also includes in the other side of therir lands an Art Deco house and an 18-hectare garden-park.

Liquid Pavilion by depA Architects. Photograph © Josè Campos

Here, near the park’s lake, depA architects, has constructed a reflective pavilion using screening short films. The pavilion is filled with colour, light and echoes, ëcamouflaging itselfí in its host environment. The design seeks to establish an indirect relationship with the nature and Siza’s museum building, which opened in 1999. The project has been photographed by José Campos

Description of project by depA Architects

The pavilion uses both the Museum building and the Serralves Park as its raw material, each one in a different scale. Firstly, the pavilionís design establishes an indirect relationship with the Museum building.

The pavilionís design is a polygon extracted from the Museumís layout, corresponding to one of its characteristic spaces ó the bow window ó whose classic hexagonal matrix is repeated and emerges at various times throughout the Park, both in the pavements and the landscape features. The concave polygonal configuration of this layout provides the perfect base for a projection space.

Secondly, the extracted polygon, once implanted in the Park and with its original context altered, including the transformation of its shape and materiality, becomes something new and detaches itself from its original source. In this second stage, the pavilion approaches the Park, establishing an affinity with its textures and finding its own materiality. It is implanted on top of the lake, whose water offers its principle: dark glass that mirrors its reflection and also the surrounding landscape of dense foliage.

The pavilion is filled with colour, light and echoes, ëcamouflaging itselfí in its host environment.

Finally, in addition to the relationship between the Museum and the Park, it also establishes a bridge with the artwork that it harbours, due to its location and the relationship that it obliges the visitor to establish with the water. However, the pavilionís interior is sufficiently neutral to create the space required to be able to discover the video projected inside.

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Site plan. Liquid Pavilion by depA Architects.

Plan and elevations-sections. Liquid Pavilion by depA Architects.

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Architects

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depA Architects

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Design Team

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Carlos Azevedo, Jo„o CrisÛstomo, LuÌs Sobral, Miguel Santos, Sara Pontes, Margarida Leit„o, ¬ngela Meireles, Hugo Sobrosa

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Engineering

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Edgar Brito, LuÌs Oliveira

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Construction

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Otiima Art Works

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Hosted Artwork

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O Peixe, Jonathas de Andrade

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Client

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Fundação de Serralves

Carlos Azevedo, Carlos M. Guimarães, Luís Sobral, João Crisóstomo. depA

The depA collective was created in Porto in 2009. It is now run by Carlos Azevedo, João Crisóstomo and Luís Sobral and its staff covers the areas of architecture and the social sciences.

depA is focused on researching architectural practice through active listening on the idiosyncrasies of each project. There is a specific commitment to the dimension of time in the interventions: ranging from the interpretation of existing structures and architectural heritage to the open and progressive reintegration of spatial systems.

Some examples are the Casa da Cultura de Pinhel (Pinhel House of Culture), winner of the prize for best museum practice and an honourable mention by the Portuguese Association of Museology (2016), Casa do Rosário (Rosário House), winner of the Concreta Under 40 award (2017), honourable mention in the Nuno Teotónio Pereira prize in 2019 and honourable mention in the João de Almada Prize in 2019 and the Pavilhão do Lago (Lake Pavilion), winner of the FAD awards, in 2018.

Alongside this depA seeks to keep its practices and investigations relevant by taking part in competitions, which are special moments for wide-ranging and compelling research. Among them is the first prize achieved for the design of the Santiago Ydañez Museum of Contemporary Art (2010), in Jaén, Spain; the second place in the public tender for the renewal of Quinta de Baixo (2014), in Porto, and the first place for the design of the Mechanized Pedestrian Paths(2017), in collaboration with Pablo Pita architects, which will connect the riverside area of Porto to the upper town.

The collective has also designed more artistically focused projects that challenge the approach to architectural techniques, as well as being catalysts to a more pluralistic and cross-disciplinary conceptualisation. It was invited to design the set of the Fórum do Futuro (Forum of the Future) in 2018 and, that same year, Pavilhão do Lago (Lake Pavilion), built at Serralves Park as part of the 32nd São Paulo Bienalle - ‘Incerteza Viva’ (Living Uncertainty), was selected to be exhibited at the 16th International Architecture Exhibition, as part of the 2018 Biennale di Venezia, while Sulco (2019) is part of the Desencaminharte project, which recognises and values artistic production in the Alto Minho region of Portugal. Alongside these projects, depA has also worked with Daniel Steegman, Lais Myrrha and Dayana Lucas, in close collaboration for the production of their projects.

In 2019, depA was awarded the tender for the curatorship of the Portuguese representation at the 17th International Architecture Exhibition at La Biennale di Venezia, in 2020, with the In Conflict project.