ECOWEEK
2021
ROME
Towards Intersectional Justice
What, and who, matters in architecture?
Which voices speak through the built landscape and through its written histories?
How, and from whom, is change generated?
This is the fourth of a series of online events by ECOWEEK, an NGO with the mission to change people’s habits and promote sustainability.
The 48-hours virtual event will focus on the intersections between environmental
and social struggles, to challenge, once again and with more strength,
the way we think, talk and write about architecture.
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A large number of women architects, talking from multiple locations and from different research-grounds, will discuss about architecture and transitional justice, colonial heritage and decolonization, refugee camps and humanitarian settlements, public space and feminism, environmental and labor struggles.
Going through a session of virtual lectures and panel discussions, and a session of virtual theoretical and ‘hands-on’ (from your desk) workshops, we aim to offer
an eye-opening and empowering experience, in order to change the way we
think about sustainability, resilience, and climate adaptation,
through sustainable design and placemaking in today's world.
ABOUT
ECOWEEK is an NGO, established by architect and environmental expert Elias Messinas, with the mission to raise environmental awareness and to promote the principles of social and environmental sustainability through design.
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Since 2005, ECOWEEK has developed programs in 17 countries and a network in 56 countries.
ECOWEEK workshops engage young architects and designers, in innovative practices
and sustainable design, green buildings, and placemaking,
that re-imagine and reshape public space.
ECOWEEK creates platforms of learning and doing, of initiating change in neighborhoods and cities, and empowering young professionals. Through international conferences and sustainable design workshops in cities around the world.
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After numerous hands-on and physical events, ECOWEEK created a series of online challenges. The first one was launched in May 2020 and under the topic of
Circular Economy in Design, and it was followed by the first virtual exhibition
of ECOWEEK and the 15 year Anniversary in October 2020.
The new online model attracted more than 500 participants from 20 countries.
‘Towards Intersectional Justice’ is the fourth in a series of online challenges.
Marking the 15-year anniversary of ECOWEEK, the next challenges will include an online event in May 2021 to join European partners in celebrating Green Week 2021; and an anniversary physical international high profile event in August 2021 in Aegina, Greece,
to address the challenges of sustainability, circular economy, and climate change
in the theme of History-Tourism-Sustainability.
ECOWEEK brings together professionals and students of Architecture, Design,
Landscape Architecture, Industrial Design, Planning,
Visual Communication and graphic design, and other disciplines.
From what our past participants tell us,
the ECOWEEK experience is life-changing, eye-opening and empowering.
Join us!
SAVE THE DATE
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ECOWEEK 2021 AEGINA
29 | 08 - 05 | 09 | 2021
THE _ PROGRAM
All hours displayed are GMT+1 Rome time and ETS/GMT-5 New York time
All sessions take place through virtual meeting platforms only
sunday 17 | 01
saturday 16 | 01 saturday 16 | 01
16h00 Rome | 10 am (EST) _ opening introduction
Elias Messinas _ ECOWEEK founding chairman
Maria Luisa Palumbo _ architect, researcher, educator
Despoina Kouinoglou _ ECOWEEK associate
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16h10 Rome | 10:10 am (EST) _ L E C T U R E S
moderators : Maria Luisa Palumbo & Sofia Passia
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Reclaiming Spaces for Social Change
Suad Amiry _ writer, conservation architect
RIWAQ: Centre of Architectural Conservation, Ramallah
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Right-to-Truth and Transitional Justice Memorials
Esra Akcan _ architect and historian
Cornell University
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Decolonizing Fascist Colonial Heritage
Sandi Hilal _ architect, artist, educator
DAAR, Decolonizing Architecture Art Research
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Rebelarchitette : Detoxing architecture from inequalities, a plural act
Francesca Perani _ architect, designer, activist
RebelArchitette
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17h20 Rome | 11:20 am (EST) _ P A N E L I
Discussing architectural practices
chair : Francesco Bedeschi & Elias Messinas
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Alessio Battistella
ARCò Architecture and Cooperation
Nasrin Mohiti Asli
Orizzontale
Aslihan Gunhan
Architect and educator
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17h50 Rome | 11:50 am (EST) _ P A N E L II
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Discussing practises of education
chair : Consuelo Lollobrigida & Despoina Kouinoglou
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Alessandra Battisti
architect, La Sapienza University
Alessandro Melis
architect, University of Portsmouth
Anna Chiara Cimoli
art historian, State University of Milan
John Folan
architect, University of Arkansas
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18h15 Rome | 12:15 pm (EST) _ S H O R T B R E A K
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18h30 Rome | 12:30 pm (EST) _ closing summary
Elias Messinas & Maria Luisa Palumbo
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19h00 Rome | 1:00 pm (EST) _ MEET ONLINE WITH THE TUTORS
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16h00 Rome | 10 am (EST) _ W O R K S H O P S
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16h15 Rome | 10:15 am (EST) _ 3H ONLINE DESIGN PROCESS
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19h00 Rome | 1:00 pm (EST) _ short break
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19h30 Rome | 1:30 pm (EST) _ presentation & closing summary
Elias Messinas & Maria Luisa Palumbo
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THE _ SPEAKERS
Maria Luisa Palumbo
architect, researcher, educator
/paesaggisensibili.com
Architect and senior fellow of the McLuhan Program in Culture and Technology of Toronto University, since 2003 I am a member of the Italian National Institute of Architecture in Rome. My research focus on architectural theory as a practice of social engagement, to question and promote notions of justice, ecology, and democracy. I am the author of New Wombs: Electronic bodies and architectural disorder (Birkhauser, 2000) and Paesaggi Sensibili. Architetture a sostegno della vita (Duepunti, 2012); and the editor of Architettura Produttiva (Maggioli, 2012), Laboratorio Roma (Aracne 2016), and Fare Città nella Città (Aracne 2017). I am a regular contributor to Artribune, Domus, and Eastwest. In 2012, I curated reMade in Italy, final section of the Italian Pavilion at the 2012 Venice Biennale of Architecture, with Luca Zevi as the main curator of the exhibition Italian Architecture, from Adriano Olivetti to the Green Economy. I am currently a Phd student at the History of Architecture and Urban Development (HAUD) program at Cornell.
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WORKSHOP : W1 _ The place of gender
Suad Amiry
writer, conservation architect
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Suad Amiry is a writer and a conservation architect. She is the founder of RIWAQ: Centre of Architectural Conservation, Ramallah, Palestine. Amiry and her Organization RIWAQ received several international architectural awards, amongst them the prestigious Aga Khan Award for Architecture in 2013.
She is the author of the well-known book Sharon and My Mother-in-Law (2005) which has been translated into 20 languages and was awarded the prestigious 2004 Viareggio Prize.
She is the author of numerous non-fiction books including:
Nothing to Lose But Your Life: an 18 hour Journey with Murad (2009), Menopausal Palestine. Women at the Edge (2010), Golda Slept Here (2014), Damascus (2016), and Peasant Architetture in Palestine: Space, Kinship and Gender (2018). Amiry’s latest book An English Suit and a Jewish Cow (2020) has been been published in Italy. Amiry taught architecture in the Department of architecture at Columbia University, the Birzeit Universty and the University of Jordan.
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LECTURE : Reclaiming Spaces for Social Change 16h15 Rome | 10:15 (EST)
Esra Akcan
architect and historian
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Esra Akcan is Michael McCarthy Professor in the Department of Architecture and the Director of IES at the Einaudi Center for International Studies at Cornell University. Her research on modern and contemporary architecture and urbanism foregrounds the intertwined histories of Europe and West Asia, and offers new ways to understand architecture’s role in global, social and environmental justice. Akcan received awards and fellowships from the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies at Harvard University, Graham Foundation (3 times grantee), American Academy in Berlin, UIC, Institute for Advanced Studies in Berlin, Clark Institute, Getty Research Institute, Canadian Center for Architecture (2 times scholar), CAA, Mellon Foundation, DAAD and KRESS/ARIT.
She is the author of Landfill Istanbul; Architecture in Translation; Turkey: Modern Architectures in History (with S.BozdoÄŸan); Open Architecture: Migration, Citizenship and Urban Renewal of Berlin-Kreuzberg; Building in Exile.
Her upcoming books are Abolish Human Bans and Right to Heal.
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LECTURE : Right-to-Truth and Transitional Justice Memorials
16h15 Rome | 10:15 (EST)
Sandi Hilal
architect, artist, educator
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Sandi Hilal is an architect, artist and educator. She has developed a research and project-based artistic practice that is both theoretically ambitious and practically engaged in the struggle for justice and equality. She is currently the Co-Director of DAAR, Decolonizing Architecture Art Research, an architectural and art collective that she co-founded in 2007 with Alessandro Petti and EyalWeizman, in Beit Sahour, Palestine. She co-founded Campus in Camps in 2012, an experimental educational program hosted in Dheisheh Refugee Camp in Bethlehem with the aims to overcome conventional educational structures by creating a space for critical and grounded knowledge production connected to greater transformations and the democratization of society. Her latest publication Permanent Temporariness (Art and Theory, Stockholm 2019), co-authored with Alessandro Petti, is a book, a catalog, and an archive that accounts for 15 years of research and experimentation. Permanent Temporariness was published in connection with DAAR’s eponymous retrospective exhibition that was inaugurated at the New York University Abu Dhabi Art Gallery in 2018, and at the Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven in 2019.
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LECTURE : Decolonizing Fascist Colonial Heritage 16h15 Rome | 10:15 (EST)
Francesca Perani
architect, designer, activist
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Francesca Perani is an Architect and designer, her work ranges from interior architecture to interactive design, from illustration to activism. In 2007 she established FrancescaperaniEnterprise www.francescaperani.com , an award winning studio based in Bergamo, Italy.
Material and visual experimentation, trial and error, emotional and communicative charge finds its expression in spaces, objects and graphics.
The practice is driven by the power of shared creativity as an effective instrument to bring about change.
Co-founder and curator of activist project RebelArchitette www.rebelarchitette.it advocating for equality in Architecture through the open dissemination of 1000 female role models.
She is the founder of cutoutmix www.cutoutmix.com : an internationally popular free open platform as an answer to the growing need for more equal and diverse cutouts populating design renders.
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LECTURE : RebelArchitette : Detoxing architecture from inequalities, a plural act
16h15 Rome | 10:15 (EST)
Francesco Bedeschi
architect, educator, expert of sustainable design
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Based in Rome, Italy, Francesco Bedeschi is an architect, educator and an expert of sustainable design. He currently serves as the Director of the University of Arkansas Rome Center, the European Hub of the University of Arkansas and a professor of integrated architectural design and restoration. He is also the manager and coordinator of the program of study in Italy of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, State of New York. A member of the Executive Committee of the Green Building Council Italia, Francesco has played a pivotal role in the growth of the organization and in establishing relations with the American counterpart. In 2010 he founded the Lazio Chapter, where he was elected President. Bedeschi was also appointed the Coordinator of the Standard Committee for the development of the Historical Building Protocol at GBC Italia. Furthermore, Francesco works as sustainability consultant with SINERGI Integrated Building Sciences LLC, a private company with offices in the USA, Mexico and Italy. Under SINERGI, Francesco has led the growth of the Company’s services in the European market - gaining project experience with both the USGBC’s LEED Rating System for International Projects as well as the GBC Italia protocol.
Alessio Battistella
ARCò Architecture and Cooperation
Chairperson of ARCò Architecture and Cooperation, with which he carries out design and applied research activities in the field of sustainable architecture in humanitarian emergency contexts.
Member of the Advisory Board and Professor of the Design for Development Master at Politecnico di Milano.
Member of the Scientific Committee of IN/ARCH (Istituto Nazionale di Architettura).
Member of the Scientific Committee and Track leader of S.O.S. - School of Sustainability
ARCò’s works have been featured on many publications and architectural journals, and have received international awards such as the Young Talents Renzo Piano Foundation Award and the Holcim Award for Sustainable Construction.
Nasrin Mohiti Asli
Orizzontale
In 2013 she graduated with honors in Architecture at the Sapienza University of Rome with an experimental project for a new hosting center for refugees model in Rome. In 2008 she trained in Spain at the UPV of San Sebastian. In 2012 in Berlin she collaborated with the Mila Office architecture studio. Since January 2011 she’s part of Οrizzontale, an architecture collective based in Rome, with which she works throughout Europe on experimental projects crossing the fields of architecture, urban planning, public art and self-construction. She received numerous awards including: "Young Talent of Italian Architecture 2018" from CNAPPC, YAP MAXXI 2014 promoted by MAXXI Rome and MoMA NYC, RomArchitettura (2015-2017) promoted by INARCH.
Aslihan Gunhan
Architect and educator
Aslihan Gunhan is an architect and Ph.D. candidate in the History of Architecture and Urban Development Program at Cornell. She also serves at the Graduate Advisory Committee of the Society of Architectural
Historians. Her research investigates the histories and representations of modern architecture in the late
Ottoman Empire in its broader geography, with questions of migration, displacement, dispossession, and violence, through comparative modernities and postcolonial theory.
Her dissertation project, titled Displaced Modernities: The Ottoman Empire, Turkey and the Specters of Armenian Builders, is the recipient of a 2019 SSRC Mellon International Dissertation Research Fellowship.
Gunhan is a Fulbright alumna (2015).
Consuelo Lollobrigida
art historian, researcher, educator
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Consuelo Lollobrigida is an art historian, post graduated fellow at Sapienza University, Rome, and Adjunct Professor of Art History at the University of Arkansas Rome program. She attended the Master in Patrimony and Heritage of the Church (Pontificia UniversitàGregoriana, Rome) and completed her Ph.D. in Art History at Sapienza University, Rome, with a thesis on women artists in Baroque Rome. She worked as researcher in Italian and international Museums such as Macro, The National Museum of Palazzo Venezia and Palazzo delle Esposizioni.
She taught Museums Studies and Pedagogy of the Cultural Heritage at Sapienza University, Rome, as lecturer from 2005 to 2012 at the College of Humanities. She is the author among other of: Plautilla Bricci. Pictura et Architecturacelebris. L’architettrice del Barocco Romano (Roma: Gangemi International, 2017); Anna d’Austria e Plautilla Bricci. Indizi di matronage reale nella Roma del Seicento(Universidad de Granada, 2016); Following women artists. A Guide of Rome (Foligno: Et Graphiae, 2013); Maria Luigia Raggi. Il capriccio architettonico tra Arcadia e Grand Tour (Roma: Edizioni Budai, 2012); Introduzione alla Museologia. Strumenti e Metodi per operatori museali (Firenze: Edizioni Le Lettere Università, 2010).
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WORKSHOP : W4 _ Women in Art and Architecture
Francesca Riccardo
architect
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Francesca Riccardo is an Adjunct Professor at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Arkansas Rome Program. She is Ph.D. in Sustainable Urban Project with a background in architectural composition. Since 2006 she deals with research and education in architecture, with a special focus on neighborhood regeneration and housing. In 2008, she defended her Ph.D. thesis entitled “Renovation strategies for social housing estates” at the Roma Tre University, Italy. She did most of her research at the Delft University of Technology, Holland, thanks to a one-year scholarship of the Rotary Foundation by the Rotary International. After a two years research contract at this university, she came back to Italy where she worked as a researcher and teacher at the Venice University Institute of Architecture, IUAV, the Sapienza University of Rome, and the University Studies Abroad Consortium of the Università degli Studi della Tuscia, Viterbo. She now works at the University of Arkansas Rome Program where she teaches Architecture studio, Studio Urban Focus, Interior Design studio, Architecture of the City, and Modern and Contemporary Rome.
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WORKSHOP : W4 _ Women in Art and Architecture
Alessandra Battisti
Architect, La Sapienza University
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Architect, PhD in Environmental Design, Associate Professor in Architecture Technology and Environmental Design, at “Sapienza” Rome University, where she is also:
Head of the Master’s Degree in Landscape Architecture; Head of the Master’s Degree in Architecture Urban Regeneration; ROFILE IN ENDirector of the 2nd level Master's degree course in Valorisation and Enhancement of Small Historical Centers; Member of the Faculty Board and Teaching Staff Member of the PhD in Environmental, Technological Design.
Since 1992 she has been carrying out research, teaching and experimentation activities on topics such as technological innovation for environmentally aware architecture, buildings’ ecological and energetic efficiency, bioclimatic approach in design. From 1994 to 1996 she was researcher at TechnischeUniversitaetMuenchen in the "LehrstuhlfuerEntwerfen und Baukonstruktion II", under the guidance of Prof. Thomas Herzog.
Allesandro Melis
Architect, University of Portsmouth
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Design Director and Founder of H21, a multi awarded international architecture practice, Alessandro Melis has received a Master and a Ph.D. in Architecture and Urban Design from the University of Florence. He is Professor of Architecture Innovation at the university of Portsmouth and the architecture research leader of the Architecture school. He is director of the Cluster for Sustainable Cities.As an academic his specialist teaching and research interests are in the fields of climate sensitive design, urban mutations, and community resilience. Previously he was head of technology and director of the Postgraduate engagement School of Architecture and Planning at the University of Auckland, Director of the TPI Urban Strategies Postgraduate Master at the University of Applied Arts Vienna. He has been appointed by the Italian Government as the curator of the Italian Pavilion Venice Biennale 2021.
Anna Chiara Cimoli
Art historian, State University of Milan
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Anna Chiara Cimoli is an art historian based in Milan. After graduating in Art History, she earned a diploma in Museology at the Ecole du Louvre in Paris and a Ph.D. in History of Architecture from the Polytechnic of Turin. She teaches a course in Social History of Art
at the State University in Milan, as well as a workshop in Museum mediation. Since 2001 she has been an associate of ABCittà, a collective of urbanists and cultural deigners; in this context, she designs experimental projects aimed at audience development and a more layered representation of cultural diversity. She has published extensively in the field of the relationship between museums and society
(https://independent.academia.edu/AnnaChiaraCimoli).
Anna is co-editor of the blog
museumsandmigration.wordpress.com
and co-director of the online magazine roots§routes.
John Folan
Architect, University of Arkansas
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John Folan founded and leads the Urban Design Build Studio (UDBS), a collaborative of students, professors, and allied professionals who work with community residents on implementation of appropriate, affordable, replicable design solutions. He also founded PROJECT RE_, with a mission to reuse materials and facilitate landfill diversion; rebuild communities by strengthening capacity of local residents; and restore lives by teaching people trade skills to secure a living wage. In 2019, John was appointed architecture department head in the Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design at the University of Arkansas. His work has been recognized by the American Institute of Architects (AIA),
the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ASCA), and Design Corps SEED Awards. John has been registered as an architect since 1995 and a LEED Accredited Professional since 2008.
THE _ WORKSHOPS
the place of gender
with Maria Luisa Palumbo
Four texts, four authors, four women's voices about the space of the home, the space of the city, the space of the planet, and the space of design and of history writing.
Reading and discussing bell hook's text on the home as a space of resistance, Kim Anne Savelson's text on gender and race, Alice Friedman's text on the Schröder House, and Donna Haraway's text on the Anthropocene, we will talk of violence and liberation struggles.
We will think through issues of women's exclusion and inclusion. We will share thoughts about what and how we studied architecture, about the voices we heard and we keep with us in each line we trace. We will talk of collapse, about refugees and refuges, and of making kinships, and of making space in a more gentle and inclusive way.
The organisers will send you the readings before the workshop, all you need to do is come to the (virtual) table prepared to discuss them. Together, we will read, write, share and talk collectively (and in breakout rooms).
W 1
designing
the protest
with Francesca Perani
Designing the protest: signs of resistance
(‘cause all voices need to be heard)
Protest signs have long been used on the picket line and in marches around the world, playing an indispensable role in appropriating public spaces.
Our current global crisis has been highlighting new community needs.
The fragility of both private and public spaces, the need for a sustainable integration and inclusion.
Marches and protest performances (online-offline) are crucial growing opportunities for change in the next future. Starting from collective research on itineraries of protest signage, the workshop will focus on designing display of signs, posters, banners, installations, stencils, graffiti, personal accessories, flags, physical or digital performances.
The workshop is a call to action in building alternative narratives for a global community united by a shared ideal of democracy, equality, respect.
WANT CHANGE?
DESIGN YOUR PROTEST!
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public toilets
for all
with Alessandra Battisti
Co-tutors: Livia Calcagni
Alberto Calenzo, Cristoforo Cattivera
Designing public toilets for all: between technological innovation and gender identity.
The workshop focuses on the need of environmentally and socially conscious design in everyday places. Architecture not only plays a crucial role in the acknowledgement and embodiment of concepts of equality, diversity and inclusion, but it must also act as a driver for change blurring the boundaries of gender identity by means of re-designing the built environment.
The design task is about an ecological, gender free public bathroom capable of ensuring access to safe,
hygienic, inclusive, technological, innovative and smart sanitation services that provide privacy and dignity for all. The design framework involves demand and performance requirements related to comfort, accessibility, management and environment: key issues involve the achievement of good thermal comfort, natural ventilation, natural lightning and greening indoor strategies due to their influence on psychophysical health and well-being.
International institutions architecture universities and city municipalities are moving in this direction as it is also an issue with respect to the human right to water and sanitation (Goal 5, SDGs) and to universal access and gender equality (Goal 6, SDGs).
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women
in art and architecture
with Consuelo Lollobrigida
& Francesca Riccardo
The workshop will explore the presence of women artists in Rome, from 16th to 18th century. Starting from a preliminary inventory as drafted out in my book ‘Following Women artists. A Guide of Rome’, participants will be asked to charting and mapping on Giovanni Battista Nolli’s Pianta di Roma women artists’ houses and workshops (or botteghe) and their works of art sheltered in Museums, Galleries, Churches and palazzi of Rome. Through images of paintings, sculptures, and buildings, we will stress out the position of each artist and contextualize her work in the given art historical period.
This revisited Nolli map, will constitute the workshop outcome. Well beyond the map, our process will provide a methodological model to be applied in any time and space to give voice to those who have been excluded and hidden by the history.
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HOW TO REGISTER
1 _ check the program
2 _ choose your workshop
3 _ and register here!
REGISTRATION IS NOW CLOSED
LECTURES
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Join us for the livestream on the ECOWEEK Youtube Channel
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WORKSHOPS
Workshops suitable for students, young and established professionals in the disciplines of Architecture, Design, Landscape Architecture,
Industrial Design, Planning, Visual Communication and Graphic Design.
Other professions may also join and experience working with these disciplines. Best for graduate or undergraduate students in second year on.
Participation in the workshops requires a time commitment.
Please allocate this time for yourself.
The workshop participants will receive a certificate of attendance
by the end of the event.
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THE _ PARTNERS
THE _ ORGANISERS
Elias Messinas
Founding Chairman of ECOWEEK
