Three Counter-hegemonic Projects

Abstract

There is a hegemonic practice in the Southern Brazilian province of Rio Grande do Sul, and certainly in many other parts of Brazil, which disregards the need to create open spaces and buildings which are what some call everyday infrastructure, that is, public facilities that can make daily life more dignified, especially for the low-income population. This practice results from a non-explicit but dominant hegemonic thought in Brazilian politics and administration. Curiously, it does not depend on ideologies, as not even left-wing municipal and state governments dedicated themselves to building such equipment. This text presents three projects that seek to oppose the hegemonic thinking described above. The projects illustrate architectural responses to three situations characterized by neglect: the lack of qualification of open spaces in cities, the almost total absence of equipment that can foster cultural life and social relations, and the indifference to how historical heritage and consolidated urbanism are treated. The methodology involves identifying a problematic urban situation, transforming it into a program for a design studio at the undergraduate and graduate levels, carrying out the architectural design simultaneously with the students, discussing the project in class, and seeking to disseminate it in order to establish a discussion about the problem that gave rise to this response, more than about design itself.