Rural Habitat at 0° Latitude The Architectural Project as a Tool for a Critical Investigation on Living

In the PhD proposal drawing is considered an investigative tool, an instrument through which asking questions and develop complex solutions. The research process provides an iteration between questions and proposals (Thomsen and Tamke, 2009), developing a non-necessarily linear dialogue between theoretical concepts and design explorations1.

The method starts from a critical reinterpretation of various approaches to the description of the rural house, especially referring to the Italian context starting from the ‘30.2.

The elaboration of an interpretative system, starting from the recognition of morphological units, will allow to represent the multidimensional relationship occurring between the dwelling and the socio-spatial phenomena.

The preliminary explorations consisted in a re-drawing of 35 different rural houses along the Province, establishing a first typological classification and individuating the elements of permanence and mutation. Regarding the survey, the tool of sketch acquires a particular relevance as a primary generator for an intellectual reflection.

Analyzing the dwelling in its complexity, the exploded axonometric projection will be investigated as essential to understand the system of spatial relations: external/internal, public/private, function/meaning. In order to overcome the schematic aspect of the representation and to shift from a descriptive to a critical observation, some images of the current condition of rurality in Global South will be produced. This operation will be realized through the tool of the one-point perspective, varying the height of the observer, from the human eye to the aerial perspective, in order to identify the differences in the perception of the object.