www.thebuiltocean.com
Architects require solid ground on which to base their practice, yet oceans have always been a key element shaping the history of architecture and the built environment. This conference sets out to shift the focus of architectural history from the land to the sea. The Built Ocean invites reflection on a singular idea: What if the history of architecture were also told from the perspective of the sea?
The Faculty of Architecture of the University of Porto will host a European Architectural History Network Thematic Conference. The three-day event will address the planet’s bodies of salt water as areas of increasing urbanization (through the building of structures such as underwater cables, oil rigs, offshore wind farms, etc.), as connectors between cultures (navigation routes for people and resources, transported in the form of knowledge, labour, and materials), or as an ecosystem functioning, in connection with the land, as an environment offering essential life support (defining climatic patterns and providing resources, from food to raw materials, and services, from carbon sequestration to large-scale habitats).
The conference brings together scholars representing a wide range of interdisciplinary knowledge and sets out to cover a broad chronological scope, from archaeological sources to more recent accounts of ecological decline and potential futures. Where is the architecture of the sea? To what extent does the built environment impact saltwater landscapes? What reciprocal impacts do seascapes have on the built environment?
Over forty speakers from around the globe will deliver in person presentations, scholars from Harvard to Sydney, from São Paulo to Oslo, from Malaysia to Costa Rica, from Porto to Toronto, from Lisbon to Reykjavik. The geographers Phil Steinberg and Kimberley Peters, whose work has brought new light into ocean ontologies, will be delivering the keynote lecture “Ten Myths About the Ocean”, opening the conference with a unique session to all audiences at Cinema Passos Manuel.
The scientific committee is composed by André Tavares (University of Porto), Christy Anderson (University of Toronto), Paul Bouet (ENSA Paris-Est), Carson Chan (Museum of Modern Art, New York), Nancy Couling (Bergen School of Architecture, ETH Zurich), Mari Lending (The Oslo School of Architecture and Design), Helen Rozwadowski (University of Connecticut) and Panayotis Tournikiotis (National Technical University of Athens).
Co-organized by the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Porto with the European Architectural History Network, as part of the Fishing Architecture research project, funded by the European Research Council (ERC) through a Consolidator Grant under the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme (grant agreement no. 101044244).
