NEW SPIRITUAL TERRITORIES

My project reflects on the spiritual being and its need for a meditative life to become more attached to the world and our equals and to create (artistically or philosophically). And how a place -a spiritual place-, nature or architecture can affect us in such direction. May it provide users with a consciousness that enables them to make the difference.

In a virtual and uncertain world where humans get emotionally ill, my work searches for the bond between humanity and the land, reflecting on our roots and existence. Looking ahead into the future, as we leave our footprint in history: transcending time. It interacts with a cultural landscape, with spiritual reminiscences. Mount Breamo, in Galicia, (Spain) a land of pilgrimages, the location of a “castro” (a Bronze Age settlement), the romanesque church of San Miguel de Breamo and a pilgrimage from the town Pontedeume to the top, where the church stands. I found out that these 3 elements are related from east to west, aligned on St. Michael's day pilgrimage, coincident with the autumn equinox, likely not by chance, when the sun sets on this axis. This association of several layers of cultures and existences is called syncretism and its mark left on a territory is a cultural landscape. I worked on 3 strands: 1- A master plan for the safeguarding of the mount. 2 - A Visitors & Research Center, which is located on one side of the pilgrimage path, slightly away from the axis and the constructions, values the place and responds to the existing needs of multiple kinds of users moments and needs. I based it on the monastery archetype working in multiple layers and functions from the collective to the private. But rethinking the typology to integrate it into nature. I set a cohesive language with past echoes. the program has: • Visitor’s centre: Community refuge, cafe, interpretation centre. • Cloister and cells: for people looking for a moment of meditation or study. • Research centre: for researchers and conservators 3 - The Spiritual pavilion in a path, connects the existing elements on this mythical axis, but underground to remain resounding but not so evident. A pilgrimage, as it should be in Galicia, towards the end of the world. It has a symbolic program that aims to move those who pass through it, with 3 moments of pause for meditation. The whole project seeks contrasts consciously (anthropologically universal, as the body-soul pair), which are reflected in the two projected elements, the tectonics and the graphics too