Cerdà and the Barcelona of the Future. Reality versus Plan
20 Oct 2009 - 21 Feb 2010
GATCPAC New layout of streets based on a module of 400 x 400 m connecting to the Cerdà Plan (Barcelona C.F., Pla Macià, 1934)
COAC Historical Archive - Demarcation of Barcelona
COAC Historical Archive - Demarcation of Barcelona
CERDÀ AND THE BARCELONA OF THE FUTURE. REALITY VERSUS PLAN
As part of the Year of Cerdà.
From 20 October 2009 to 21 February 2010
Few cities have an orderly form that identifies them in the way that Paris, New York, Rome and Barcelona do. In the case of Barcelona, rather than the product of the dictates of an absolute power or monarchy, this order was imposed by the will of the city and its authorities-and, of course, the valuable plan of Ildefons Cerdà.
The Eixample is the result of a strong, rational idea which has produced a highly complex city full of rich nuance in the course of its 150-year implementation. All major urbanistic projects take time to be developed and often remain incomplete. Throughout its various phases, the Eixample has gradually found connections and proposals which have modulated it, giving it its present-day form.
This exhibition immerses itself in today's reality to discover and interpret given forms of urban organization. It sets out to reinterpret the Cerdà plan and its initial ideas, discover the underlying urbanistic and social values, and explain its more general importance as a constantly evolving part of the city.
This examination of a great project that engineered a transformation that was unimaginable in the Barcelona of the mid-19th century, a walled city surrounded by dynamic settlements in the Barcelona Plain, may serve to suggest new ways of understanding today's reality and, above all, of approaching the mid-term future with a similar ambition to that of Cerdà and his peers.
The exhibition is divided into different sections with three core themes:
A) The urbanistic richness of the Cerdà plan. The formal abstraction of the rules introduced by the plan and the judicious reinterpretation of the city's geographic and urbanistic context guaranteed its implantation. The exhibition will evaluate its present-day reality in order to analyse the plan's values:
Which elements have survived and are capable of ensuring its continuance?
What aspects have been added to the Cerdà plan as the construction of the Eixample continued?
What is the result for the morphological system?
How can we understand the functional complexity of the Eixample?
Which complementary projects supported the Cerdà Plan?
B) Cerdà's Eixample in the tradition of grid cities designed around the world. Barcelona as a paradigm being developed simultaneously on different scales.
C) The Eixample in the metropolitan system. Its interpretation as a basic infrastructure that links the city's parts. Models or ways of seeing the central metropolitan system on the basis of the experience of the Eixample.
As part of the Year of Cerdà.
From 20 October 2009 to 21 February 2010
Few cities have an orderly form that identifies them in the way that Paris, New York, Rome and Barcelona do. In the case of Barcelona, rather than the product of the dictates of an absolute power or monarchy, this order was imposed by the will of the city and its authorities-and, of course, the valuable plan of Ildefons Cerdà.
The Eixample is the result of a strong, rational idea which has produced a highly complex city full of rich nuance in the course of its 150-year implementation. All major urbanistic projects take time to be developed and often remain incomplete. Throughout its various phases, the Eixample has gradually found connections and proposals which have modulated it, giving it its present-day form.
This exhibition immerses itself in today's reality to discover and interpret given forms of urban organization. It sets out to reinterpret the Cerdà plan and its initial ideas, discover the underlying urbanistic and social values, and explain its more general importance as a constantly evolving part of the city.
This examination of a great project that engineered a transformation that was unimaginable in the Barcelona of the mid-19th century, a walled city surrounded by dynamic settlements in the Barcelona Plain, may serve to suggest new ways of understanding today's reality and, above all, of approaching the mid-term future with a similar ambition to that of Cerdà and his peers.
The exhibition is divided into different sections with three core themes:
A) The urbanistic richness of the Cerdà plan. The formal abstraction of the rules introduced by the plan and the judicious reinterpretation of the city's geographic and urbanistic context guaranteed its implantation. The exhibition will evaluate its present-day reality in order to analyse the plan's values:
Which elements have survived and are capable of ensuring its continuance?
What aspects have been added to the Cerdà plan as the construction of the Eixample continued?
What is the result for the morphological system?
How can we understand the functional complexity of the Eixample?
Which complementary projects supported the Cerdà Plan?
B) Cerdà's Eixample in the tradition of grid cities designed around the world. Barcelona as a paradigm being developed simultaneously on different scales.
C) The Eixample in the metropolitan system. Its interpretation as a basic infrastructure that links the city's parts. Models or ways of seeing the central metropolitan system on the basis of the experience of the Eixample.