The Emotional Power of Space. 1/4_Bêka & Lemoine with Domitilla Dardi. Public lecture

Public Lectures 2023/24
The Emotional Power of Space

Bêka & Lemoine 
Learning from observation
followed by a conversation with Domitilla Dardi

Thursday 21 September 2023 19:30
Teatro dell'architettura Mendrisio
 

Through a selection of recent projects including films and books, Bêka & Lemoine will present the long-term, multi-facet and unconventional research they have been developing over the years at the crossroads of non-fiction cinema, video art and social sciences. Putting forward the question of experience in the way we collectively relate to space, their work questions the role and impact of architecture, and the built environment at large, from an anthropological point of view.

Ila Bêka and Louise Lemoine are visual artists who work in a variety of media, such as film, video installation, photography and books. They experiment with new narrative and cinematic forms to explore how people experience, perceive, and relate to space from an emotional, social, and cultural standpoint. Their films are widely shown at renowned museums and cultural institutions, as well as various biennials and international film festivals. Together, Bêka and Lemoine have made over thirty films, among them are ‘Koolhaas Houselife’ (2008), ‘Barbicania’ (2014), ‘The Infinite Happiness’ (2015), ‘Moriyama San’ (2017), and the large scale project ‘Homo Urbanus’ (2017-2023). The Emotional Power of Space is their latest book (B&P, 2023).

Domitilla Dardi is an Historian and independent Curator of Design. She graduated in Art History at La Sapienza, Università degli Studi di Roma, and obtained a PhD in History of Architecture at the Università Federico II di Napoli. Since 2007 she has been Professor of History of Design at the European Institute of Design (IED) in Rome, in both bachelor's and master's degree programs. From 2003 to 2007, she taught Design History and Contemporary Art History at the Facoltà di Architettura in Ascoli Piceno. She has been Visiting Professor at several institutions, such as the Universidad de Navarra in Pamplona, MADE in Siracusa and Abadir Academy in Catania.
From 2007 to 2023, she has been Senior Design Curator at MAXXI, the National Museum of 21st Century Art in Rome

The Emotional Power of Space
Curated by artists-filmmakers Bêka & Lemoine in close line with their own practice, « The Emotional Power of Space » is a series of talks that brings to the Academy of Architecture in Mendrisio filmmakers who share a common sensitivity and anthropological approach in the way they bring attention to the relationships between people and their living environment. These talks will present their respective approaches and methodologies and their way of using cinema as a critical tool of observation of the social consequences of rapid urban transformations taking place in different part of the world.
 

• 26 October 2023 Daniel Kötter ‘How to adress rapid urbanisation in film'
• 16 November 2023 Nitin Bathla + Klearjos Eduardo Papanicolaou ‘The Sensing Machine: Reframing Ethnographic Film for the Urban Otherwise’
• 30 November 2023 Giovanna Borasi + Daniel Schwartz ‘I've Been Lonely Lately: Filmmaking as a curatorial practice of coming together’
   

Lectures take place at Teatro dell'architettura Mendrisio and are streamed live.