Do Convento de Santo António da Cidade à actual Biblioteca Pública Municipal do Porto. Projectos de intervenção de Eduardo Souto de Moura

Abstract

This Master's Dissertation aims to approach the Eduardo Souto de Moura's architecture, taking as a case study the building of the old Santo António da Cidade's Convent (Convento de Santo António da Cidade) and current Municipal Library of Porto (Biblioteca Pública Municipal do Porto). Located in Porto, in the area of São Lázaro, this building met over time proposals and diverse architectural interventions. The latest, from the authorship of the architect Souto de Moura, dated from the end of the last century and the beginning of the current one, has resulted, on one hand, in the rehabilitation of spaces, and on the other hand, in submitting a project proposal for the expansion of the building. The relevance of this proposal of the rehabilitation of the Children's Library and the Auditorium, which is already accomplished, and the expansion of the building of the Library, neither accomplished or published so far, comes to take account of essential aspects such as the City and its history in their relationship with the territory. In doing so, it offers study elements liable to contribute to the identification and interpretation of multiple aspects of Architecture. The study of the context, the history of the Convent and its transformations, was the starting point of the reflection presented here. Based on the historical and architectural knowledge gained from the building, we seek to uncover, on one side, the methodological strategy followed by Souto de Moura to build on the existing, and on the other side, to identify and measure the influence of the pre-existing aspects in its expansion project. The idea that helps us in this study is that a project can only be understood in its fullest when inserted into the overall context of the work of an author and/or in connection with the work of other authors. This idea led us to analyze, in parallel, another work of Souto de Moura, the project of the rehabilitation of the Bernardas's Convent (Convento das Bernardas), in Tavira. The analysis of this project, as well as the building study of Municipal Library of Porto and Souto de Moura's proposals for its rehabilitation and expansion, allowed us to identify a recurring methodology of this architect on building new on the old. It also permitted us to advance some conclusions about the meaning it attaches to its architecture and to the City as a project development tool of this nature.