Abstract
A casa de Siza (sine distant ia) begins with the analysis and description of the Ovar “Casa Duarte” project documents (started by Álvaro Siza on December, 1980, 21 sheets in “caderno” 72, with the collaboration of Miguel Guedes, until the Autumn of the year 1984 when the design of the shelves for the upper floor was concluded: QUADERN I, II, III). First face of a two faces very long panel which in an almost spontaneous, imperative and impulsive way leads to the other face, to another house: his first houses, four houses in Matosinhos (1954-57), the first ones of a sole project, his daily work, the “Casa de Siza” (QUADERN IV). Along the way, the sine qua non: interest and attention of Álvaro Siza, availability and involvement of Josep Quetglas, hard work and study on the Siza works supported by his sketches and his masters – sculptors, painters, poets, architects, artisans, people (Távora, Pessoa, Gaudi, Picasso, Le Corbusier, Oud, Wright, Aalto, Lewerents, Gropius, Mies, Kandinsky, Loos, Taut, May, Scharoun, Brunelleschi, Miguel Angelo, Palladium, Terragni…) – and to me …, time, wish and will to make it in an useful, necessary, and communicative way. But before everything, with the help of Chiara (Guedes, Anabela, Maria João, Isabel, Siza’s staff) the documents related with Casa Duarte, belonging to Siza personal files in Rua do Aleixo 52, were collected, photographied, listed, edited using the same scale and sequenced in a first instance. They were joined by those ones I managed to find in multiple publications where, from 1982 on, the house and its project could be known, commented, visited; and by photocopies from the Siza “cadernos” (72, dated 12/80; 75, dated 2/81; 77, dated 3/81; 89, dated 8/81; 93, dated 10/81; 94, dated 11/81; 99, dated 1/82; 107, dated 4/82; 111, dated 5/82; 124, dated october 82), where he draws, takes notes, writes, his main working tool, intimate and essential, tracking record of his continuous, obsessive and compulsive work.
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