The Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia (IAAC) is glad to announce that Daniel Ibañez and Vicente Guallart, Director and Founder of IAAC respectively, together with Manuel Bouzas, will participate in “FOODSCAPES”, the Pavilion of Spain at the 18th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia taking place from 20 May to 26 November 2023.
Amorim Cork. Oporto. Credit and © Pedro Pegenaute
The curatorial team and project for the exhibition have been selected by an independent jury appointed by Spain’s Ministry of Transport, Mobility, and Urban Agenda after an open call. FOODSCAPES, curated by Eduardo Castillo-Vinuesa and Manuel Ocaña, will explore the Spanish agro-architectural context to address global issues. At the Biennale Architettura 2023, the Pavilion of Spain will take visitors on an exploratory journey through the architectures that sustain us, from the small-scale domestic kitchens to the large operational landscapes that provide nourishment to our cities. The winning project developed by Daniel Ibañez, Vicente Guallart and Manuel Bouzas “Drinking Forests: A Metabolic Recipe of Wine,” will explore the relationship between wine and forests and how the winemaking process generates a cultural and sensory journey that is linked to the regions where the wine is produced.
© Pedro Pegenaute
Drinking Forests: A Metabolic Recipe of Wine
The production of wine entails a double structure: for each vineyard producing the main ingredient, there is a forest making its production possible. In the ‘shadow’ of grapes, wood enables key transformation processes that result in wine. Drinking a glass of wine is the realization of metabolizing wood and grapes along a long value chain for an extended period. Using this metabolic framework for the recipe allows you to understand how these biomaterials circulate, transform, and produce wine.
The fundamental ingredients for winemaking are five: wood from pine, oak, and eucalyptus, cork oak bark, and grapes. From barrels to stoppers, all these wood species involved are metabolized and inscribed as an intrinsic part of this beverage to the point that there is no wine without forests and wood. Furthermore, the involvement of these ingredients automatically generates a cultural, sensory, and cognitive connection with Spanish geo-specialized territories of production and transformation. Every time you drink a glass of wine, you drink the landscape of the Rioja Alavesa, savor the Galician forests, or smell the cork oak groves of the Portuguese Alentejo. From this perspective, selecting wine as a recipe embarks you on a trans-scalar journey “upstream” towards forests and landscapes where wine is born. And, in the process, you inherently become involved with some socio-ecological problematiques of our time. In this winemaking tour, you will be the passenger and wood your vehicle.
Credits
Drinking Forests
Curated by Daniel Ibañez and Vicente Guallart (URBANITREE) + Manuel Bouzas
Pavilion of Spain at the 18th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia
The Pavilion of Spain is organised by the Government of Spain through the Directorate-General for Urban Agenda and Architecture of the Ministry of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda, Acción Cultural Española (AC/E), and the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), in collaboration with TBA21 Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, and with the support of the European Climate Foundation and Fundación Arquia.
Acknowledgments
Drinking Forest’s research was made possible thanks to the input of numerous people who enabled to reconstruct an essential part of the value chain of wine including: Gonzalo Entrecanales, Daniel Moreno, and Beatriz Borja from Bodegas Entrecanales e Hijos; Ismael Oliveira, Agustín del Rio, and Carlos Iglesias from FINSA; Javier Villaverde from Viveros Viforsa; Beatriz Martin from Amorim Cork; Ricardo Vargas from Estuches Vargas; Elena Madurga from Tonelería Magreñan; and Elena Ceca from Tonelería Murua. Finally, special thanks to the curators of the Spanish Pavilion at the Venice Biennale 2023, Manuel Ocaña, Eduardo Castillo, Ana Ara, and photographer Pedro Pegenaute.