Art Gallery Catuçaba in Brazil by CRU! architects

Article source: CRU! architects

The clients’ idea of an art gallery was that art and nature are intertwined and art should be presented in a natural environment. Throughout the hotel property various art installations can be found. By being in nature one should be more receptive to see and feel art, according to the hotel owner. The art gallery has to host changing exhibitions offering clients a variation of art. This art gallery was built by a community eco-building cooperative that was aided by CRU! Architects. The idea of this social building project was to provide training and job-development for a deprived community. After the community center, commissions were sought outside of the village of Camburi in order to have economic return for the cooperants, of which this art-gallery is an example. The entire bamboo-structure was executed by the local cooperative, whilst the brickwork, excavations and foundations were done by the local workers from the farm which the hotel is located on.

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

• Architects: CRU! architects, (Sven Mouton)
• Project: Art Gallery Catuçaba
• Location: Catuçaba, São Paulo, Brazil
• Photography: Nelson Kon
• Client: Hotel Catuçaba – Emanuel Rengade
• Contractor: Community cooperative of Camburi – Bamburi

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

The location of the art-gallery was set between the main farmhouse of which it depended (Fazenda colonial Portuguese style) and the Occa, a communal space built by an Amazonian Indian tribe where originally several families could live together. Aside from this no further requirements were made.  The art-gallery, arising between the colonial farmhouse and the indigenous communal space, had to unite these two different styles. On that account, the design from the outside outlines the colonial Portuguese style with its white walls and blue doors similar to the farmhouse, and shows an Indian heart/core on the inside (being the bamboo structure). The narrow passage, the arcs and courtyard in the middle refer to ancient monasteries and hereby tries to invoke a divine sensation. A small fountain is situated in the center of the patio from where the water runs back into the river, giving oxygen to the river below by making the water fall some 5m. By providing 13 doors one can enter the gallery from each point augmenting the transparency but maintaining a particular curiosity to see what´s inside. The floor level on one side extends the building and partly floats over the river giving a visitor the ability to look at the art gallery from a distance.

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

The gallery is entirely based on the golden proportion – the width and height of the different parts correspond to the rules set by the Greek and Roman architects such as Vitruvius. It is meant to be a humble construction that fits the colonial style of the surrounding, but that also refers to the occa nearby. A portuguese face with an indian heart. Since art can be considered sacred, the spiritual  language of a monastery arch-way was used to house the exhibitions. In the original sense a gallery was a covered walk or passageway, narrow and partly open along a wall. It derives from the old French galerie, “a long portico” (14c.), from Medieval Latin galeria, of unknown origin. Sense of “building to house art” was first recorded in 1590s. A flat roof of 2.9 m high was foreseen to avoid unnecessarily elevating the structure and maintaining a low profile, offering the farmhouse and occa a primary role. Three existing 30 meter high palm trees are integrated in the design and even one of these palm trees goes through the roof. The art-gallery is nearly quadratic (15 x 11 m) with a passage way of 2.10m wide.  The floor plan is divided into 15 squares of 2.10m x 2.10m and every square, except the latter two, has a proper door opening centered in the middle. The columns are placed outside these squares on an 80cm broad border in blue stone and weathering steel. The walls consist of bricks finished with a lime plaster on the outside. On the inside the bricks remained in sight but both sides were white-washed. For the structure,  bamboo culms were used, being Phyllostachys Aurea 50mm diameter. Only for the arcs the locally found bamboo species Bambusa Tuldoides Munro was used with a diameter of 40mm. These were cut on site and curved, anointed with gasoil and simultaneous heating the cane with a blowtorch. The arches support the wind braces and trusses between two columns and therefore are part of the structural system. The roof is made with aluminum prefab plates that afterwards were covered with Bambusa Tuldoides Munro culms for aesthetical reasons.

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

The local eco-building cooperative, which training was essential to the project had perfected their techniques over the years and is now capable of, besides community and local housing, making high-end buildings that can serve middle-and upper class clients. These kind of clients provide an interesting revenue that is partly used in salaries and partly used in community infrastructure so that few outside investments need to be found in order to improve their own infrastructure. In art-the gallery, the owner sometimes frees space for local artisans that get a chance to expose and sell their artworks, beside better known artists on other occassions.

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © Nelson Kon

Image Courtesy © CRU! architects

Image Courtesy © CRU! architects

Image Courtesy © CRU! architects

Image Courtesy © CRU! architects

Image Courtesy © CRU! architects

Image Courtesy © CRU! architects

Tags: Brazil, Sao Paulo

Category: Art Gallery

This entry was posted on Monday, January 7th, 2019 at 6:34 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.