“With an Acre” is the ultimate chapter within the three-part movie and exhibition sequence “Groundwork”, that explores the conceptual improvement and area analysis of up to date architects cultivating various modes of observe in mild of the ecological disaster.
How can architects contribute to efforts to regenerate land affected by the load of an extractive historical past and unstable local weather situations? What instruments can smallholder farmers use to deal with the environmental and social penalties of colonial settlement, urbanization, and industrialization?
These are among the many questions rising from “With an Acre”, the third and ultimate chapter of “Groundwork”, a movie and exhibition sequence exploring the conceptual improvement and area analysis of up to date architects cultivating various modes of observe in mild of the ecological disaster.
The arabica espresso plant was launched to Brazil 300 years in the past and, via the exploitation of enslaved then immigrant labour, grew into an business that takes up two million hectares of land right now. Centuries of extractive tradition haven’t solely devastated the ecosystems however entrenched social inequities. Unpredictable and excessive climate occasions are additional threatening livelihoods within the countryside. Regardless of a brutal historical past and ever-precarious current, there’s a motion in direction of regenerative agriculture and reforestation.
“With an Acre” follows Carla Juaçaba as she develops a museum and group area in solidarity with Flor de Café, a collective of smallholder farmers in Minas Gerais. Impressed by the temporality of Indigenous collective buildings and the type of freeway billboards that mark the prolonged rural panorama within the area, Juaçaba proposes a landmark on an elevated plantation overlooking the city of Nepomuceno. Mild and tactical building will present an area for sharing data, providing a symbolic stage of resistance whereas leaving a minimal hint on the earth. The pavilions will body views of the area, however extra importantly will set a imaginative and prescient for the way forward for the territory.
Guided by an urgency to know the basic ways in which architects are enacting change within the constructed surroundings, curators Francesco Garutti and Irene Chin, alongside movie director Joshua Frank, current a layered reportage: whereas the movie (2025, 45 min) narrates the aspirations for the mission from a number of views of the collective, the exhibition displays the architect’s ongoing analysis. With an Acre is the story of Juaçaba’s seek for an important set of gestures in solidarity with actions of agrarian reform and forest conservation, and for structure to supply a sensible scaffold for resilience.
“Structure just isn’t for oneself, however for others. I’ve felt this much more strongly on this case as a result of Milena is an unbelievable individual. She has labored with the farmers for years; I’ve not. She has been transformational within the lives of generations of farmers, who are actually conscious that they need to have their very own product as an alternative of promoting it like they used to, and that they need to create their very own worth. She is considering the training of youngsters, and she or he can also be interested by the museum. The museum is rooted in her thought of retelling the historical past of Brazil via the historical past of espresso, which is the story of the destruction of our forests, however it’s also going to be a residing museum about biodiversity.”
—Carla Juaçaba in dialog with Marina Oba about her work with Flor de Café and the collective’s founder, Milena Rodrigues. You’ll be able to learn the total dialog Dimensions of an Concept revealed on cca.qc.ca as a part of Forces of Friction to mark the opening.
at CCA – Canadian Centre for Structure, Montreal
till September 14, 2025
