Interweaving and public spaces
a spontaneous aggregation
“The university must be an active, open part of society, of the town, towards which it has both rights and duties. Usually it takes its rights, but it is less concerned with its duties. Just as the university is using the city and its territory, in the same way the university should reciprocate, and be usable by the city and its territory. There are, obviously, parts which should be closed and private (though these are far fewer than might be imagined), but all the rest can be more public. [...] In a university really worthy of the name, every citizen should be free to enter and listen to a lecture. You could say, “well, what stops anyone from attending a lecture now?” I believe the answer is the architecture itself. Thresholds, for instance, are the expression of authority and institutionalization. And the most important barriers are those thresholds which you cannot touch. The issue of easing access should be much more important than simply concern for disabled entrances. In a way, we are all disabled when we cannot use a particular space. Thresholds built up in words are more powerful than physical thresholds.”
Giancarlo De Carlo
Starting from the main idea of De Carlo, we decided to appropriate one space and carry out a collective activity open to anyone who wants to join. We have thus decided to develop a series of days dedicated to the weaving of a series of small elements, then joined all together to form what will be the concretization of this appropriation of a public place.
Action and partecipation are two keywords of the project. When those activities that are usually performed alone and in private places are transported in unusual places and carried out collectively, they inevitably establish relationships and dynamics within the place and those who are part of it on a daily basis. Everything that happens inside a place is absorbed into it and are interwoven to form the spirit of the place as we know it.
Following this process of thoughts, instinctively we choose the weaving technique to be the main theme of the project. The inexperience in the subject allowed us to learn together with the others and to deepen this technique, not imposing ourselves as teachers but as students open to the exchange of techniques and solutions.
In those days, just like so many colored threads on a loom, the curious, the participants and those who passed by intertwined and met. We mixed, camouflaged and integrated undisturbed, realizing in a concrete way the idea of public space so dear to De Carlo. The tapestry obtained from the union of individual pieces, traces of the passage and action of those individuals who have spontaneously gathered together, represents the realization of the idea of space, of appropriation and of open collaboration; a human action that will remain interwoven in that place and in the memory of those who attended.
