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Buildings continue to produce forms of life long after they have been abandoned. CORTEN approaches architecture as an infrastructure capable of generating new forms of occupation. The work is centred on the Centro Multiusos de Lamego, Portugal—an institutional building whose structural failures led to its gradual abandonment. Conceived to serve a public and political function, the building instead became the site of a different history, shaped by neglect and decay.

Based on a three-dimensional scan of the structure, the installation follows the building's transformation as it was reappropriated by younger generations. Its deteriorating interiors became a canvas for graffiti, while its empty spaces were reclaimed for informal and often risky activities, revealing how abandonment can generate new forms of social use and cultural expression beyond those originally intended.


By bringing architecture and bodies together within the same digital environment, the installation dissolves the boundaries between document, memory, and fiction. The building is no longer understood as a static object, but as a living infrastructure capable of producing new social, affective, and symbolic relationships.

Rather than documenting a specific site, CORTEN reflects on the capacity of architecture to continue shaping modes of inhabitation long after its original programme has collapsed. Even in ruin, infrastructures remain active, continuously reorganising the uses, bodies, and narratives that become inscribed within them. In this sense, the Pavilhão Multiusos is understood not simply as a failed public building, but as an evolving landscape in which institutional intentions give way to forms of occupation emerging from those who inherit its spaces.



June, 2022 funded by the project ViViFICAR at Lamego. 5 min, scanning 3D videoart, multiple single-channel sound, projector.
MutableCorporeality
NonAnthroCorpus