Neruda in construction: An analysis of his Chilean houses
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Date
2015
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Abstract
Isla Negra, Michoacán, La Chascona and La Sebastiana are the names that the Chilean Nobel lauret poet, Pablo Neruda, used to refer to his houses. Neruda build his houses, he named them and wrote poetry to them. The names, as the houses, are full of charm and mystery and seem to evoke many things: a territory, a location or a tribute to a woman. The proposition in this paper is that through their construction Neruda offered us not only a rich collection of original and somewhat eclectic edifices and an insight to his rich life, but also a set of buildings that were carefully thought and built in search of a perfect combination of 'creative individual' and 'collective social' space. This was done through multiple interventions to his houses that can be best understood through a configurational analysis of the different construction stages. The many studies carried out on Pablo Neruda's houses, have privileged the analysis and description of each space as separate entities, their particular history, their individual meaning, not aiming at a global spatial perspective and the configurational aspects have not been explored. By contrast, this paper is based in the historiography of Pablo Neruda's houses, and how he planned and built their expansion. A study of their spatial configuration is put forward. It aims at unveiling the deeper significance of each house from a systemic perspective, and even more of the set of houses understood as a particular Nerudian way of living in space. Although different in terms of volume and form, the houses express a rich spatial language of its own creator. Neruda was not only the owner or occupant, but interfered directly in the design of these spaces. The result is a set of homes that are able to enchant by their idiosyncrasies, by the mix of materials, and especially due to their spatial connections. The paper is part of a post-doctorate research in progress, using the space syntax theory and methodology. The theory is able to reveal a spatial language; the space convex methodology was used and the graphs of permeability, depth and integration measure revealed how the houses have become the Nerudian space. The approach was essential to: i) study each house and its particular process of expansion or alteration; ii) analyze them as a set, comparing the final version of each house with one another. The result is a spatial concept with a clear intention of establishing multiple connections from the outside, creating a shallower structure in Isla Negra and Michoacán or a deeper structure in La Se-bastiana and La Chascona. In all of them, Neruda's private workspace, the space of his creation, can be described as a segregated and isolated tower, while the collective social area occupied shallow spaces, often connected to the exterior. In fact, not surprisingly, Neruda challenged social conventions in his distribution of the private and public functions.
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Creative isolation, Design synthesis, Private and public domestic space, Residential space, Space syntax