Opening: Thursday, May 10th 2007, at 6pm Quiero una casa Direct Architecture, Politics and Space Marco Scotini, curator Santiago Cirugeda, "Quiero una casa" On Thursday 10 May the Borgovico 33 contemporary art space in Como hosts the opening of a personal Santiago Cirugeda exhibition, the second of the Direct Architecture. Politics and Space project curated by Marco Scotini. Santiago Cirugeda, "Quiero una casa" Santiago Cirugeda, "Quiero una casa" The creator of short-lived and manipulable architecture and strategies that occupy the public space, Santiago Cirugeda works in the urban reality with subversive and unconventional projects. For Direct Architecture the Spanish artist wants to stage a "toolbox" for citizens' use. "In the studio we are always receiving messages from the homeless or people who find themselves in an illegal or precarious situation" said Cirugeda in a recent interview and a desperate request for a house in a woman's e-mail, Quiero una casa, has become the title of his Como exhibition. Two videos will be presented in the Borgovico 33 exhibition space: the first, produced with animation, illustrates the procedures for a do-it-yourself-build housing unit using prefabricated modules; the second will be filmed inside Borgovico 33, to record the assembly of the prefabricated modules by a group of students from the NABA specialist two-year course with the aid of the first film. All the construction parts will be on display during the exhibition, along with examples of legislation decreeing the legitimacy of the dwelling designed by Cirugeda. Anyone must be able to assemble the kit in any situation, as if they were Ikea furniture or the small components in a Kinder egg. Quiero una casa is a sort of practical manual or democratic guide for city users. It is not by chance that "Recetas Urbanas" ("Urban recipes") is the name of the website conceived by the artist as an open archive of rules and instructions for all possible participants. Santiago Cirugeda, "Quiero una casa" Santiago Cirugeda, "Quiero una casa" "I want to be a citizen" is Cirugeda's slogan and he does not accept legislation a priori, choosing civil disobedience in the form of architectural intervention. Although, as an artist, he can obtain permission for his installations, his stance remains that of the citizen, who is constantly called upon to collaborate in every project. The urban actions of Cirugeda, who sees architecture as a social art, hove between the legal and the illegal. In 1999 he added a capsule to the block of the Finnish Pavilion in Seville as a spatial and functional prosthesis and in 2004 he proposed another unauthorized extension on the fa©ade of another institutional building Ð the Espai d'Art Contemporani in Castellón. This was created with black plastic crates normally used as concrete forms Ð in an attempt to verify an art centre's flexibility and openness to new uses. Similarly, in 2001 he designed temporary shelters he called "insect-houses" on the trees along the Alameda Avenue in Seville in a sign of participation in an act of ecological protest and urban guerrilla; in 2003 he created a 30-square-metre volume in one of the abandoned spaces in the Lavapiés district in Madrid as a community cultural centre and in 2006, with the aid of students, he constructed trenche-classrooms as self-management spaces for the Faculty of Fine Arts in Malaga and Granada. The assertion of everyone's right to public space and direct access to urban construction becomes a form of deconstruction of the biopolitical control mechanisms that govern the contemporary city via capital and the prevailing culture. 4 Jul: Trincheras autocostruidas. Campus Teatinos. Malàga. Spain. 2006 Santiago Cirugeda (Seville, 1971) studied Architecture in Barcelona and Seville, where he lives and works. Since 1996 he has developed subversive projects in the urban reality: from systematic occupations of public spaces with simple containers to the construction of prostheses on building facades, patios, roofs and attics. His collective exhibitions include the Moscow Biennial (2005); 50th Art Biennale in Venice - section Utopia Station; Crossroads of n°11 creation, Design and habitats, Centre George Pompidou, Paris (2003); The Tent, Architecture Biennial, Rotterdam (2003); Research Room, Manifesta 4, Frankfurt (2002). He writes articles, lectures and is involved in cultural events (masters, seminars, conferences, workshops, exhibitions). He is currently developing construction projects for living units with the direct participation of groups of citizens in several Spanish cities. He presented the book Situaciones urbanas in October 2006. The whole project will be accompanied by a catalogue, to be published at the end of the exhibition cycle. Information Title: Quiero una casa by Santiago Cirugeda Period: 10 May Ð 8 July 2007 Inauguration: 10 May 2007, 6pm At: Associazione Culturale Borgovico 33, via Borgo Vico n¡ 33 Ð Como - Italy — www.recetasurbanas.net Info: Elide Brunati tel. +39 031 576029 fax +39 031 3385220 info@bv33.org — www.bv33.org Admission: free, Friday to Sunday 3 pm to 8 pm or by appointment Press Office: Marta Colombo tel. +39 340 3442805 — martacolombo@gmail.com Supported by: Embajada de Espana en Italia With the contribution of: Thanks to: La Nuova Termoidraulica Cavagnoli Srl