Abstract
M.Tech. (Architectural Technology)
My name is Ricardo Rodrigues and I am fascinated in the relationship between sound and architecture.
My year began with a series of explorations into sound and performance, and performance in space. Through short
exercises looking at routes through and in the city, I began to build up a vocabulary of sound, space and performance
at different scales and in different contexts.
The field trip to Cape Verde, lead me to exploring the local culture through their music. Being of Portuguese descent
myself, the ability to converse in the local language gave me a unique insight into certain aspects of Cape Verdean
culture. The importance of local artists in Cape Verde – as opposed to imported international music –seemed to be
one striking and important aspect of their musical culture and heritage.
My Major Design Project, the Embaixado Di Performa proposes an architecture derived from sound.I’d like to take
you through the chosen site and show how I’ve interpreted sound in terms of form, structure and materiality.
Sucupira, the largest market in Praia, the capital city of Cape Verde, has the highest daily foot traffic rate of anywhere
in the city. It is a thronging, bustling marketplace, full of life, colour, sound and noise. Using sound, performance,
melody and rhythm, it is my intention to stage an intervention in the heart of Sucupira that both explores and exposes
the relationship between music and architecture in new and unexpected ways.
Bernhard Leinter said that, ‘The the fundamental phenomenon of sound is its development in time. Architecture is
basically static; time is introduced through changes in daylight, periods of different intensity of noise and above all,
through the movement of people. Sound-architecture is, in its essence, an event of temporal development. Space is
developed gradually in time. But it is not a space, it is a constant sequence of spaces.’