These conversations were full of questions that we had never asked ourselves or of support for ideas that although we had had, we did not believe in them, because we needed a kaleidoscopic and wide-ranging look from someone who, like Andrés, would give them value and encourage us to go deeper into them.
For many of us, a generation educated in the early 90s, far from any center of thought, and where in architecture, after a few years of formal and decorative excesses, there was not much left to believe in or to look towards, the visits and contact with Andrés was one of those lights that showed us and illuminated a path to follow, and which, thanks to his generosity and commitment, quickly allowed us to build our position, which even today has allowed us to reach unexpected places to teach and learn, as well as to work on projects with solid ideas and firm principles.
Texts, visits to our own and other people's buildings, classes, conferences, and conversations have been the usual means of exchange with Andrés, both in Spain and in Colombia, but also the occasional note, the inevitable Christmas card and e-mails exchanging our books or texts by others have fed that conversation over the years.
Fontán building by Andrés Perea, Elena Suárez, Rafael Torrelo. Photograph by Ana Amado.
But perhaps the most striking memory that I treasure with great affection and as something transformative in the academic sphere was the meeting of schools and pedagogy that we attended in Madrid in the autumn of 2008 for two days, and that a couple of years later we replicated with Andrés in Medellín in the framework of the Ibero-American Architecture Biennial in 2010. The intensity of the debates and the constant question of "how do you teach architecture and what for" are still present in our academic life.
During those days we learned to doubt the linearity of our mental processes and our design process because we learned to question ourselves and review why we wanted to simply repeat what we had learned when we could not only transmit it but also expand and question it, to shape other views, linked to fascinating authors and build our voice.
Hand in hand with the meetings, there was also a bonus, because beyond the academic scenario there were obligatory activities, going out for dinner or lunch, and with this, through Andrés, we made new friends and other doors and conversations took shape. If architecture is the design of relationships in space, as we like to believe and do, we cannot deny that the role of people like Andrés has been to be precisely that action that this definition of architecture proposes: Andrés has allowed us to relate to each other in space, be it academic, professional or disciplinary but like all good architecture or as the great, generous and just scholar that he is, he has known how to give us a space of our concerning a wide world, beyond his borders or ours, and that in many of us has been present, indelible and unforgettable as an action.
Undoubtedly, our gratitude to Andrés will always be infinite, because this designer of relationships in time and space also designed a part of ours, that which allows us to constantly learn to learn and which, like any good friend, shows us that we are what we do and that as this principle is indivisible, thanks to our friendship with Andrés we have also been better people.
Text by Camilo Restrepo.
