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In Praise of Shadows

The Cyprus College of Art is an art institution offering residencies to artists and art students. It is based in Lemba, a community in Pafos, Cyprus. Its founder was the Cypriot artist Stas Paraschos, who, after establishing his studio at Lemba in 1979, invested a lot of his time and effort in attracting artists from UK and other places all over the world to come, stay and work at Lemba. The most famous landmark of the College is the ‘wall of art’ a wall created by the gradual additions of site-specific sculptures made by visiting artists over the course of the last 35 years. The College consists of guest rooms and workshops for the visiting artists and with this competition the Ministry of Culture and Education along with the Community of Lemba and the Head of College intend to renovate the artists’ studios and add two big workshops for art education, as well as more rooms for accommodating more artists and art students. Due to the fact that Stas created the College infrastructure mainly himself with the help of the visiting artists, the place has developed over the years a very distinctive informal character consisting mainly by the self-made structures, many leftover spaces used from the community of the school and the extensive intrusion of wild nature within the premises of the school.

Driven by an ‘as-found’ strategy, we base our proposal on observations and analysis of the various existing factors that constitute the informal character of the College and then we form concepts based on how these factors can be kept and enhanced.  Our concepts have to do with:

a. A praise of shadows: the extensive presence of various grades of shadow that facilitate the activities of the school both formal and informal ones. For that reason we propose shading structures that form the main structure of each intervention, create flows and form clusters for designated use.

b. The distinction between work and accommodation: We keep the existing distinction between guest rooms and workshops in two different sites, because this, according to the users’ comments, helps them integrate with the community and experience its everydayness.

c. The extension of the ‘Wall of Art’: With our proposal the wall becomes an important element in space that defines the structure of the workshops cluster and to which all the workshops are directed. We understand it as an ongoing project with which the artists interact, by studying it or adding to it. With our proposal we expect it to reach up to 60 metres along the boundary of the site.

d. The in-between and informal spaces: in these spaces nature intrudes in uncontrolled manner and the residents use them for informal activities: barbeque, eating, socialising, relaxing, or even for art projects. In total these spaces form the identity of the College, the one that distinguishes it from other similar art residencies and makes people want to revisit it more than once. With our proposal we protect these spaces and attach them to the main program of the College, preserving the natural element and leaving them open to non-programmed uses.

c. The natural materiality: Due to the custom-made and self-made character of the infrastructure, the College has a natural and informal materiality: up-cycled materials, intense nature, wood and stone structures. We propose that the main structure of the new buildings to be constructed by wood and completed by wooden panels with insulation and protected by fabric covered with bitumen emulsion. All structures should be reversible and all materials should be recyclable.

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PROJECT: Cyprus College of Art

CLIENT: Ministry of Culture and Education, Community of Lemba

PLACE/TIME: Lemba, Cyprus, 2016

BUDGET : 1,800,000 E

DESIGN TEAM: Christiana Ioannou, Christos Papastergiou

TEAM ASSOCIATES: Andrea Kleanthous, Stephania Georgiou, Agelina Voulgari, Kyriakos Myltiadou

Credits to www.skalgubbar.se for the figures used to visualisations.

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the ‘Art Wall’ of Lempa

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Pictures from the College workshops, picture from the chalcolithic settlement of Lempa

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View from the Residences ‘Miniature village piazzas’

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Models of Workshops unit and Residences units

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Axonometric of Residences

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Model of Residences

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Plans, Sections of Residences units

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Axonometric of Workshops unit

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Model of Workshops unit

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Plan, sections of Workshops unit

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Facades

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Views of Residences courtyard and Workshops entrance

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Construction details and bio-climatic behaviour of building

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