Matadero Madrid center for contemporary creation
PICO DEL PAÑUELO
Photographic Memory of the Community
Programme
The Photographic Memory project started life in the area around the so-called Pico del Pañuelo, a community in the neighbourhood of La Chopera bordering Legazpi, in the Arganzuela district.
This triangular shaped complex contains 74 houses with nearly 1600 homes, most of which are around 50 m2. This is a unique example, and rare in terms of its conservation, of the social housing communities built in the 1920s under the Cheap Homes Law. The community was an innovative way of providing housing for the working classes at that time, with homes being mainly in the form of flats and arranged in an urban block layout.
The project was intended to recover the experiences and life stories of the people who lived there, thereby contributing to regenerating and preserving the intangible heritage of the collective neighbourhood memory by recording life styles and customs. If you delve into what is meant by the term "neighbourhood", you need to build a bridge with the past, connect with the flow of the collective imaginary absorbed by the walls of homes, building facades and dirt streets that later became tarmac roads.
The project promoters want to connect current inhabitants with the personality of the neighbourhood and continue building the project together. Absorbing the past of a place involves making it current and owned. This, much more than a mere population census, is what we call “Neighbourhood Culture”.
The core of the project is the photographic memory of the community that is recovered through the images and descriptions provided by the local people. Through field work, which will be undertaken between January and June 2015, the project leaders will produce electronic versions of the images collected and accompany them with a short description that provides details like dates and events. The information compiled will be published in the project blog under a Creative Commons licence, to produce a historic and people's archive, creating a record of how Pico del Pañuelo developed for enthusiasts and researchers alike.
The contents are a gift from the original community members and their descendants for today's generations and those yet to be born. Collective memory as part of intangible heritage. The project involves the Pico del Pañuelo collective, two researchers, creative artists and community members.
The archive is an open process and can be consulted on https://pdpmemoria.wordpress.com
This triangular shaped complex contains 74 houses with nearly 1600 homes, most of which are around 50 m2. This is a unique example, and rare in terms of its conservation, of the social housing communities built in the 1920s under the Cheap Homes Law. The community was an innovative way of providing housing for the working classes at that time, with homes being mainly in the form of flats and arranged in an urban block layout.
The project was intended to recover the experiences and life stories of the people who lived there, thereby contributing to regenerating and preserving the intangible heritage of the collective neighbourhood memory by recording life styles and customs. If you delve into what is meant by the term "neighbourhood", you need to build a bridge with the past, connect with the flow of the collective imaginary absorbed by the walls of homes, building facades and dirt streets that later became tarmac roads.
The project promoters want to connect current inhabitants with the personality of the neighbourhood and continue building the project together. Absorbing the past of a place involves making it current and owned. This, much more than a mere population census, is what we call “Neighbourhood Culture”.
The core of the project is the photographic memory of the community that is recovered through the images and descriptions provided by the local people. Through field work, which will be undertaken between January and June 2015, the project leaders will produce electronic versions of the images collected and accompany them with a short description that provides details like dates and events. The information compiled will be published in the project blog under a Creative Commons licence, to produce a historic and people's archive, creating a record of how Pico del Pañuelo developed for enthusiasts and researchers alike.
The contents are a gift from the original community members and their descendants for today's generations and those yet to be born. Collective memory as part of intangible heritage. The project involves the Pico del Pañuelo collective, two researchers, creative artists and community members.
The archive is an open process and can be consulted on https://pdpmemoria.wordpress.com
