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Under the Volcano: Architectural Reparations in a State of Emergency

Part 2 Project 2024
Eoin Mangan
University College Cork | Ireland
The area of Ponticelli in Naples is a space of polycrisis. Located to the northeast of Naples and in the shadow of Mt. Somma-Vesuvius it is referred to as the "Triangle of Death" due to the accumulation of natural and human threats that impact its residents. The housing in the Via Fuortes Ghetto is emblematic of this. Built in 1980 as emergency housing as a result of an earthquake in lrpinia that left over 250,000 people homeless, they continue to be occupied but contain a toxic legacy in their construction in the form of asbestos linings—resulting in abnormal cancer incidents and poor health.

Comprised of a series of mediating architectural figures and using Bruno Latour's understanding of sites of human and natural intersections as Critical Zones, the project is constituted as a series of action-observatories. Acting against the Municipal Plan that fails overlooks the evacuation of residents in future earthquake eruptions, the project instigates a process of rehabilitation that moves across social, cultural, and material fields. Incorporating processes of education and remediation at community scale, the project acts as witness to the ongoing issues of these emergency states. In doing so, it re-figures a new social contract in architecture.


Tutor(s)
Lorenzo Cammoranesi
Kieran Cremin
Viktor Gekker
Jason O'Shaughnessy
2024
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