BARQ’s fifth edition is underway in Barcelona, using documentaries and films to look beyond buildings as monuments and explore the social, political and personal forces that shape architecture. The festival runs through November 8, with a selection also scheduled to reach Madrid on December 2.
This year’s theme is “Living Differently,” chosen to coincide with Barcelona’s role as World Capital of Architecture. The programme includes seven feature films, nine selected shorts and additional films outside the competition. Screenings are taking place at the Girona cinemas and Barcelona DHub.
Festival director Pep Martín says architecture shapes how people live and relate to one another. BARQ, he explains, uses non-fiction filmmaking to shift attention from monuments to the people affected by architecture. Its films cover neighbourhood campaigns, architects’ discussions, abandoned homes and districts undergoing reconstruction.
The festival opens with Morrosko Vila-San-Juan’s “La Ricarda, Melodía de una casa,” about a home whose history was tied to the presence of an airport. Juan Cavesatany’s “Madrid EXT,” which explores Madrid’s changing landscape, closes the event.
Among the short films, Anna Lamour’s “Our Homes Do Not Exist” portrays abandoned houses in Athens, while Sara Vardè de Nieves’s “Under the Glass” examines housing that disappeared during Salvador Allende’s government. Feature selections include Clohe Brenan’s “Verdigris,” a walk through Paris, and Carine Wallauer’s “Copan,” which presents São Paulo’s celebrated apartment block as a metaphor for corruption.
“Stardust: A Story of Love and Architecture,” by Jim Venturi and Anita Naughton, follows architects Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown through the perspective of their son Jim. The film revisits their partnership and the ideas behind their challenge to modern architecture’s rigidity, including their attention to social, cultural and personal dimensions.
It also returns to the work associated with “Learning from Las Vegas,” the influential book on pop and postmodern architecture. The film recounts how Scott Brown urged Venturi to visit Las Vegas, where she had recognised a contemporary expression of the architectural ideas they were discussing. Venturi later travelled there with students, staying at the Stardust Motel that gives the film its title.
Through the couple’s conversations, disagreements and humour, the film foregrounds their shared creative life and the complexities behind architectural projects. It is one example of BARQ’s wider programme, which uses cinema to connect buildings with the people, histories and debates surrounding them.
Sources: El País Cultura.