Architect Mario Cucinella calls for a new approach
Sustainability expert and award-winning Italian architect Mario Cucinella is in New Zealand and Australia this month (16-24 May) to discuss his theory of Creative Empathy. Creative Empathy is a vision for sustainable building where the relationship between architecture and engineering becomes genetic, and sustainable features are no longer a fashionable accessory.
“For far too long we have believed in the clear and simple illusion of technology, that we were going to be able to control everything artificially: light, air conditioning.” Says Cucinella. “Instead, we have to imagine buildings that only have a minimum of visible technology, and maximise instead the efficiency of form. These buildings will possess a high degree of empathy, a creative empathy.”
Cucinella’s view is that sustainability is diversity. It cannot be universal by definition but is against the flattening and simplification of architectural language that creates buildings indifferent to specific places – therefore is against globalisation.
The sustainability MCA employs is the creation of value, whereby the definition of value is not only economic and aesthetic but a qualitative architecture of belonging. Speaking at a series of lectures in May, he will discuss this current indifference of architecture to place, culture and energy. He believes that many of today’s cities have been arrogantly planned without listening to the voice of its people.
As a result many international building models, not suitable to the local climate and conditions, have turned architecture into a global energy problem, not the opportunity it should be to create cities in which people want to live, work, play and move around.
He continues: “Energy is an invisible issue; nobody can see it, but it is a truly global, planetary issue, and each of us can make a significant contribution in fighting against the decadence of the building sector and in favour of a true reconciliation with nature.”
“Nobody, least of all politicians, have been willing to understand the spirit of their own cities, their cultural DNA, their calling and aspirations. Therefore, what we have witnessed in our culture, is a construction of inadequate buildings, much loved by the financial markets, but not by the people.”
Cucinella founder of Building Green Futures, a non-profit organisation improving living conditions and access to resources in developing countries through integrating sustainable architecture and renewable energy and the professional training School of Sustainability in Bologna is one of Italy’s leading figures in sustainable design thinking.
He has found, time and time again, through his research and workshops, that what people ask for (more public parks, more vegetable gardens, more squares and streets for pedestrians, more respect, more clean air, and more care for their children) compared to what they are getting is an environmental lie – a totally alien image of the city.
Speaking to an audience of students, academics, architects and the public in Wellington, Auckland and Sydney this month Cucinella calls for “A new, true, and peaceful student revolution, one that demands from their universities more expertise, reliability, and quality teaching, and programs where the study of the environment would be a mandatory subject in all curricula.”
“The technological, performance-based vision should give way to the vision of beauty, of emotions, of the pleasure of being together and sharing a common space.”
“Current building models lead us to believe that we are constructing extraordinary cities and astonishing buildings, while we know nothing about their relationship to the urban context and to human beings, or to technology and the environment, all of which becomes secondary, if not irrelevant.”
“We are left with buildings that defy the laws of gravity, or worse, of good taste. They are buildings that desperately try to look modern but in ways that are far from the culturally refined ideals they pursue, and more often than not, they only create a sense of estrangement.”
Calling on his architect peers in Australia and New Zealand, Cucinella says: “It is time to restore architecture to its true dignity. It is the social responsibility of our profession to transform sustainability from something superficial, accessorial, or fashionable into a new approach to architecture, in which environmental aspects, consumption, and comfort, become top priorities, thus laying the foundations for a new idea of beauty.”
“We need to work every day at improving our work, trying to create buildings which are more beautiful, both inside and out, and which will mark the beginning of a new era: the ecological era. Now is the time to believe in a dream of cities which are more livable and leave behind the world of illusion and environmental lies.”
Mario Cucinella will present a series of lectures on Creative Empathy in May, including the University of Auckland’s annual Fast Forward guest lecture series and concluding with the 20th Biennale of Sydney The future is already here – it’s just not evenly distributed series.
EVENT DETAILS: MAY 2016
Victoria University of Wellington.
When: Monday 16th May, 17.30 – 19.30
Where: School of Architecture, 139 Vivian Street, Wellington
What: “Creative Empathy” lecture by Mario Cucinella followed by a discussion led by Sam Kebbell, Professor of Architecture, University of Wellington and co-founder of KebbellDaish Architects.
How much: FREE
University of Auckland
When: Tuesday 17th May, 18.30 – 20.30
Where: Engineering Lecture Theatre 439, Building 401, 20 Symonds Street, Auckland
What: “Creative Empathy” lecture by Mario Cucinella part of the Fast Forward guest lecture series Taking on the City/Taking on Practice 2016
How much: FREE
Italian Cultural Institute
When: Thursday 19th May, 18.00 – 20.00
Where: Italian Cultural Institute, 4/125 York St, Sydney NSW 2000
What: “Building the future now: Sustainable architecture vs globalisation” – Lecture and panel discussion as part of the Sydney Biennale’s Not Evenly Distributed series, presented in association with the Italian Cultural Institute. Architects Mario Cucinella (Mario Cucinella Architects, Italy) and Ken McBryde (Hassell), Australia) present two lectures titled “Creative Empathy”. The talks explore how architecture through sustainability principles can act against a model of working that is indifferent to place, refusing to flatten out difference through globalising narratives and economic-quantitative value systems (Cucinella), and how technology and communications can open up opportunities in education in remote areas of the world, with case studies in Borneo, Nepal and Vanuatu showing the benefit of culturally appropriate teaching facilities (McBryde). Tshering Lama O’Gorman, Program Director at Australian Himalayan Foundation joins the panel discussion. Moderated by Janne Ryan, ABC Radio.
How much: FREE
More green updates
