Morte e Vida na Cidade - Intermitências na Urbanidade: percursos pelo Bonfim

Abstract

The present dissertation arises from the interest, almost an impulse, to observe, experience and understand the spaces that remain. Those places or anything that time has allowed disinterest, impossibility, and abandonment to target. A desire to perceive, reflect upon, and contribute critically to the understanding of the micro and macrocosm of the city through the observation of phenomena of disuse and abandonment in the urban territorial system. The invisible spaces of the city thus assume themselves as a three-dimensionality that coexists and shapes our experience, taking center stage as the focal point of this study. As a sample and practical case study, I focus on the ruined structures in the Bonfim parish in the city of Porto, as well as on vacant and abandoned spaces, in an attempt to understand the reality of this issue through routes and experiences that intersect with the specific characteristics of the urban environment under scrutiny. The aim is to reflect on how the impermanence of these architectures between the life and death of the built environment, as well as the consequences of their presence in the metropolis' territory, can be reexamined in light of the notion that the city is a living entity that is born, grows, dies, and transforms itself. Therefore, it is important to consider urban ruins as the (im)permanent portrait of the spaces that surround us and how we can develop a way of thinking capable of positively overcoming the current situation of loss and abandonment in our cities.