Reunions of Contemporary Architectural Pilgrimage: The Ephemeral Unconsecrated Chapels of the Vatican for the Venice Biennale 2018

Abstract

The Venice Architecture Biennale is one of the biggest dissemination and discussion events on the discipline, which by summoning internationally to a brief stay in Venice, the tourist city par excellence, over the years it has become a kind of contemporary pilgrimage through historical and con-temporary art and architecture. In 2018, the Vatican invited a group of re-nowned and emerging architects on the international scene, to design an ephemeral non-consecrated chapel and one pavilion whose purpose was to provide parishioners or agnostics with the experience of encountering the interpretations that the architects made of a space of introspection, calm, for collective or personal prayer. We point out their design in the context where they were built, their references and an interpretation of their meanings.