As préexistências na Obra de Eduardo Souto de Moura: o Mercado Municipal de Braga.

Abstract

The analysis of Eduardo Souto de Moura's work, proven vast and diverse, allows one to recognize how the respect for the history, the place and the preexistence has a constant presence throughout his architectural path. To the architect, the place to intervene has data attached that defines and characterizes it, it is never an empty space free of preexistences and meanings. Souto de Moura finds in the place and its characteristics the guidelines for a coalescing, conscientious and responsible intervention and he does not see them as restrictions to the architecture but, instead, as the starting point for the creative process. To understand how this belief influences all his projects, it is important to observe which antecedents played a key role in his training and in his understanding of these issues. The observation of how the architect tackles these themes in some of his works becomes also relevant to understand his understanding of the history, the specificity of each place and the preexistence as indispensable instruments required to design the project. Although the circumstances are always distinct from work to work, and consequently also the strategies adopted, it is possible to verify the existence of commonalities between them that reflect how Souto de Moura understands the preexistence. The Braga Municipal Market and its subsequent renovations constitute a work crowding various interventions with different approaches to the preexistence. Their study demonstrates that Eduardo Souto de Moura sees the preexistences as inseparable elements of the designing process, assuming them and the place as operative matter that can be manipulated in order to achieve cohesive architectural solutions.