EUPavilion Eight proposals presents eight projects for the first European Pavilion at the Venice Biennale proposed by European artistic and architectural practices. The participants were invited by the curators of the exhibition to reimagine the national pavilion, still today the dominant symbolic and spatial paradigm within the Giardini. At the same time, the project for the European Pavilion provided an opportunity for asking what new representative languages are ​​needed for defining the identity of a supranational organization in a state of continuous crisis and perpetual construction like the European Union. In the light of the current debate around the strengthening of the European integration, a reconsideration of the spaces where this process happens is of critical importance for the definition of a democratic and inclusive public realm. With its long-standing tradition of exhibitions based on an architectural brief the Venice Biennale and the typology of the pavilion provide an ideal testing ground for a new kind of European public building. The variety of approaches and responses provided by the participants – who grew up both within and on the borders of a Union under construction – reveals the extent to which architecture constitutes fertile, albeit little used, ground on which to develop the debate on European integration as a cultural project. The EUPavilion project aims to raise awareness of the public on these issues, by means of design. The eight projects for the European Pavilion at the Venice Biennale are illustrated by means of 1:20 scale models, filmed and scanned by No Text Azienda, and photographed by Delfino Sisto Legnani.
EUPavilion is structured as a research laboratory exploring the relationship between architecture and European institutions. The laboratory is working with a number of partners, developing its research through the organization of public events, academic activities and publications. This website is conceived as the growing archive for the materials relating to these activities. EUPavilion is a collaborative effort that brings together architects, scholars, photographers, designers.