The main objective of the International Seminar “On the Surface:
Public Space and Architectural Images in Debate,” is to promote a global critical analysis of the relations between architectural images and public imaginaries; to understand how different types of images build diverse imaginaries: between fiction and documentary, reproduction and manipulation, or analog and digital. The event comprises an interdisciplinary Congress and a Workshop that are two distinct but important complementary events.
Several important speakers and known authors in the field of photography and image representation for architecture and public space will be present at this International Seminar. Thus, we will have the attendance of Beatriz Colomina (Princeton University's School of Architecture, USA); Robert Elwall (Photographs Curator at the British Architectural Library, UK); Guido Guidi, (Accademia Belle Arti di Ravenna, photographer, Italy); Filip Dujardin (Architectural photographer, Belgium); Christian Gaenshirt (Universität Kassel, Germany), Juan Rodriguez (Architectural photographer, Spain); Carlos Machado (Architect – FAUP), Daniel Malhão (Photographer), Diogo Seixa Lopes (Architect - FAUTL), Edgar Martins (Photographer), Fernando José Pereira (Arts - FBAUP), Joaquim Moreno (Architect - Columbia University New York), João Figueira (Architect - UTLFA), Júlio de Matos (Architect and Photographer), Luís Urbano (Architect - FAUP), Manuel Graça Dias (Architect, Director of Architectural Journal, Portugal), Paulo Catrica (Photographer), Pedro Gadanho (Architect - FAUP), Ricardo Nicolau (Art Critic, Commissioner of Photography Exhibitions’ for Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art), Sofia Thenaisie (Architect), Susana Ventura (Architect), Vitor Silva (Arts - FAUP).
Questions to be addressed in the Congress relate to how images are analyzed as instruments to question and rediscover new urban realities and to communicate new designs for societies. The dematerialization of both architectural and public space as a consequence of the massive diffusion of images through the World Wide Web, and the very convincing and interactive virtual worlds they create, generates a second set of debate themes.
Parallel to the Congress, as was already explained, a Workshop will be held that will have the active participation of FBAUP and OARSN and will comprise two cycles: one very linked to the City centre – Alves Cabral – and the other located in the oriental part of Porto and far from its centre – Campanha. The focus will be on using Architectural and Public Space photography that can invert the abandoned areas of the centre, where the demand for housing has collapsed, and the areas as Campanha that lack cultural equipments and other services, and help in this way the revival of these places. This program will expand the audience of the seminar and its visibility and will accordingly reach a wider audience and the public at large.