Today
we hosted the first open conversation at the house, having received more than
30 people at our living room. It lasted for more than three hours (we are still
trying to figure out if that is a good thing or a bad thing) and the guests
were Inês Moreira, Anselmo Canha and Jérémy Pajeanc. Inês started by
deconstructing the theme of the conversation – derelict buildings – arguing
that the former conditions that
such buildings entailed
before the financial crisis, are not operative any longer. According
to her, moving away from the semantic of real estate (empty, vacant) might bring us closer to the issues at stake.
She usually refers to empty buildings as “brown rooms” to reflect their
historical baggage, their accumulation of histories. With Anselmo we
discussed the process of transformation of a shopping mall – Stop - that was
built in the 1980s in Porto and after being empty for a few years gradually gave
room to music studios. Anselmo explained that at the moment there are over 100
bands at the mall, and they have recently formed an orchestra that helped them
gain cultural significance before the city authorities. In face of a legal
process with the city council, the bands formed a strong community wishing to
remain at the shopping mall. Jérémy is a French artist living in Porto since 6
years. He manifested his surprise towards the lack of value attributed to the
19th century houses that lay empty in the centre of Porto in
contrast to the demand for such typology in Paris. The conversation concluded
that there are three main landlords in Porto: the city council, “Santa Casa da
Misericórdia” (catholic church institution) and the banks. There was a
consensus about the need to implement a lending policy in the city of Porto,
where the city council would loan vacant buildings on a temporary basis for
cultural activities and potentially housing. The solution, according to the
architect Pedro Jordão who attended the discussion, must inevitably comprise a
public policy for culture and social action.
