Once upon a time there was a city that, for all it had to offer, which at the time were nothing but qualities and good new things, was elevated to European Capital of Culture2. With that event, and with regeneration actions, memories and further values were intensified which promoted the city’s identity to the whole of Europe. However, as the result of the city’s ambition, an egoistic Platform3 was born that saw an old Market4 that was taking up its space. Weak, retired and with nothing to do, the Market was anxious for new life and believed in a cooperation. The Platform was its hope. However, young, brash and full of vigour, as it was, the latter ignored everything and everyone from the heights of its splendour, imposing itself on the Market. [And put an end to the hope]. Faced with the indignation of the latter, and also given the lack of goodwill, the European Capital of Culture condemned the Platform to grow together with the old face of the Market. The transformation was immediate! The Platform’s destiny was to be connected to that of a charming façade and they would live together happily ever after. Unless someone forgot [the old Market]!
- But who would forget me?
[It surely would not be forgotten.]
Set in an enchanting city with a fabulous castle, a number of “pretty stone squares”5 and a set of traditions that left their mark on the heritage and memories of its residents, the belief was that the Market would remain in the memory, similar to the fragments of the emblematic city walls. A cult of yearning for the past and delirium would combine to treat the “time lived as the past continued in the present”6. Here we have the old face transformed into a mask! A mask that deceived the present… It still reminded one of the encounters and re-encounters in the Market! The cries of the Market women, the screams of the children, the dogs stealing chouriço sausage from the stalls… But then the life went and only the mask remained: the symbol of a memory that tasted of little. Without the promised social dynamics there remained the doubt of remembrance. It was the mask that deceived the future. In the end, underneath the mask was a new face: vain and selfish, the Platform was raised and it decontextualised the essence of the Market. So someone had begun to forget, after all!
So why keep my face if they were going to forget me?
[To remind us of what it saw.]
In a time of compromises opportunities would not be lacking! From the European Capital of Culture one had hoped for a stimulus for the development of the city, without forfeiting its memories. But in the old Market the story was a different one: they exchanged it for the egoistic Platform, when so many things could have happened… Imagine that the stalls had been turned into artist studios, stages, laboratories; imagine that the galleries had boxes for the audience, exhibition spaces and pottery workshops; imagine the artists’ voices calling to the streets; little boys peeking in through half-open doors; the old people sitting beneath the posters; imagine cables and grids, projectors and lights, boxes of all sizes, imagine… imagine! All one had to do was open the doors! Or perhaps it would all have been a failure! […] But he reality was a lot crueller: it transformed memory into cultural satisfaction. They sold the Market to progress, to give it life, but they forgot to reanimate its soul, which was lost in the city. But that didn’t only happen here: everywhere culture was being mass produced and sold at the lowest price. The transformation promised to be a good intention, until it became an attractive business that banalised the memory. [But hell is full of good intentions!]. To top it all off, the times had changed: there was little money and one had to be careful where and how the little money that was available was spent. Hard times... [If it weren’t for the sponsoring the story would have been a different one!] Here the fish were big, but the business filled only the plates of the few. What had promised to be an opportunity for many, was reserved for the same old few again. And the little ones didn’t get a look in either – not here, nor in any other place! And there was no lack of people: people with diplomas or those about to get one. The crisis meant no chance of employment or work. They were reduced to begging, or hoofing it elsewhere! In times of economy, one should have made good use of what one had. The “engineers”7 who were here were waiting for opportunities, jobs or business deals. But we all know that, where big business deals are concerned, the only thing of interest is the money. Sometimes people, memories and other values are forgotten… Indeed… Here little more than the business aspect remained! The Platform grew exponentially from the sale of culture, and of the old Market only nostalgia remained. Nostalgia without memory.
- I’m already being forgotten, aren’t I?
[Yes… It would seem it’s no longer of interest who you were.]
In a country with strong identities, where the memory of the place is respected, more than a simple theorem was needed. One had hoped for more. Much more! One should not at the outset exclude what remains of the old. The old memory could have been recycled. But no! They got rid of it. Of the remainders we were left with only the mask. Of the mask, one lost the memory. Without the memory, what remained was junk.
- I am forgotten now…
[…]
“In the end, waste… The city needed investment, but did it need to concede to a whim? [pfff…] To make things worse, a whim that did not bring anything new. To think of the number of “platforms” that already existed! [It doesn’t make sense!] So many desires, so many memories, so many lives, so many people, so many “diplomas”! All for nothing… Nothing was shown! Nothing was debated! Nothing was criticised! No one was heard… In the end, the people were the junk.”
- Yes, but look… As the twig is bent, so grows the tree!
[Tell me a story.] |
1 The centennial of the construction of the Arts and Creative Platform – José de Guimarães Arts Centre.
2 Guimarães 2012, an initiative of the European Union.
3 Arts and Creative Platform – José de Guimarães Arts Centre (2010 – ), designed by Pitágoras Arquitectos, Lda.
4 The former Guimarães Municipal Market (1927 – 1947), designed by José Marques da Silva.
5 Promotional video for Guimarães 2012 CEC (2011). [Online] http://www.guimaraes2012.pt/index.php?cat=15. (consulted on 09.10.2011).
6 Marluci Menezes. Da idealização do património urbano à construção de um projecto social de salvaguarda e reabilitação. in Cultura light. Porto : Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto; Departamento de Ciências e Técnicas do Património, 2005, p. 121.
7 “Engineer” is a popular term used in Portugal to designate people with university degrees, more specifically from science or technical areas. It is also commonly used for architects.