Louise Braverman Architect

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso 

Louise Braverman

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

FIRE SAFETY ENGINEER
Palhas Lourenço

ELECTRICAL
M &m Engenharia

LANDSCAPE
Maria João Ferreira

CONSULTING ARCHITECTS
Artur Afonso

STRUCTURAL
Jp Engenharia

MANUFACTURERS
Alucobond, Knauf, Otis, Plaka, Regent, Saint-gobain, Sanyo, Vicaima, Vitra

DESIGN TEAM
Artur Afonso, John Gillham, Yugi Hsiao, Jing Liu, Snow Liu, Medha Singh

LOCAL ARCHITECT
Paulo Pereira Almeida

AREA
1858 M²

YEAR
2013

LOCATION
Boticas, Portugal

CATEGORY
Visual Arts Center

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

Text description provided by architect.

Merging architecture and landscape, Centro de Artes Nadir Afonso links an emerging urban center with its pastoral environs.

The1858-square-meter single artist museum fuses a light, lucid contemporaneity with the rich materiality and sustainability of Portuguese design to honor one of Portugal’s most beloved native sons, the artist Nadir Afonso.

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

As well as paying homage to the artist, who formerly practiced architecture with Le Corbusier and Oscar Niemeyer, the Centro, along with the artist’s foundation in nearby Chaves, will serve as an engine driving economic, cultural, and community development in the region.

Sliced into a steep hillside, the new art museum is divided into two distinct, but connected, parts:

a light-filled cultural center looking out upon the intersection of a national highway and City Hall; and, nestled in the back, a vast, below-grade exhibition space topped by a green-roof park.

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

THE URBAN FACE

In the double-height Entry Hall, a photomural of the artist and a continuous band of his sketches provide punches of bright color visible from the street.

From here, the exhibition hall, outdoor café, children’s library and stairway to the auditorium beckon, as does the exterior auditorium that is designed to encourage informal civic engagement.

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

THE PASTORAL SIDE

Embedded in the hillside below a sustainably planted green roof, the exhibition hall is the heart of the museum.

Since the exhibition walls are shorter than the exterior walls, visitors can view the art against a background of the surface of the rustic stone of the recycled cyclopean retaining walls, creating a unique feeling of viewing art within a lavish grotto.

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG

While encouraging the perception of an indoor/outdoor layering of space, the proximity of the walls to the interior both blocks degrading direct sunlight and allows indirect daylight to reduce the museum’s carbon footprint.

The green roof park, designed in the spirit of Nadir Alonso’s geometric abstraction and in the tradition of Roberto Burle Marx, also naturally modulates internal temperature while offering aesthetic delight to the community.

Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG


Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
© Fernando Guerra | FG+SG


Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
Site Plan
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
Site Plan
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
Site Plan
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
Floor Plan


Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
Section
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
Section


Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
Detail
Centro De Artes Nadir Afonso
Detail

Louise Braverman Architect
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Louise Braverman Architect
16 E 79th St #43, New York, NY 10075, United States