CRA (Center for Artistic Residencies) / BURR Studio

CRA (Center for Artistic Residencies) / BURR Studio

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Text description provided by the architects. CRA is a set of support structures designed to temporarily transform one of the warehouses in Matadero Madrid into the Center for Artistic Residencies.

The spatial proposal for the Center for Artistic Residencies (CRA) at Matadero Madrid consists of a collection of supporting elements designed to create spaces for gatherings, private work, storage, workshops, and other potential needs of the artists in residence at the warehouses of Matadero.

Drawing clear inspiration from Celine Condorelli’s Support Structure Manifesto, these elements focus on the user. The intervention includes elements operating at different scales. Firstly closed storage elements are arranged with one side covered by stretched tarpaulins. These elements take the shape of “+” signs, “T” shapes, and “L” shapes on the floor plan, forming independent quadrants for four resident artists. They provide privacy for work, focused lighting, storage, and workspaces. The arrangement of these elements within the vast warehouses of Matadero Madrid creates more private individual spaces, allowing access from the perimeter for each of them. Simultaneously a common space appears, which the individual spaces converge upon, shielded from the gaze of visitors and other workers.

Additionally, a semicircular aluminum structure on wheels featuring a large curtain serves as a backdrop for presentations or meetings. Finally, separate storage and workshop spaces are established, set apart from other uses by a large textile barrier.

The structures aim to present themselves as neutral and uniform elements that do not interfere with the artistic work of the residents. They adopt a deliberately temporary aesthetic, positioning themselves clearly as servers of the space and its users.