Three-dimensional reconstruction within the crypto-history of architecture, for the historical-cultural (re)interpretation of architectural heritage in Portugal Eduardo Antunes1 , Pedro Januário2 & Paulo Pereira3 CIAUD, Lisbon School of Architecture, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal 1 ORCID: 0000-0001-8330-287X 2 ORCID: 0000-0002-8363-461X 3 ORCID: 0000-0002-9480-6376
ABSTRACT: The systematic strategies for architectural heritage preservation have been sparse of an evolving knowledge of its design process. This results from applying intervention criteria that essentially value formal aspects, neglecting its principles and context. By considering the conceptual iconological aspects of a disappeared work of art, Crypto-History allows us to understand its symbols’ past origin, whose ideological basis does not have the same cultural recognition nowadays. Applied to architecture, we believe that a methodology that explores the crypto-historical process in identifying the design criteria of historical works, integrated with the research possibilities provided by three-dimensional virtual representation tools, will allow the identification of the original stylistic conceptions’ meaning and, thus, contribute to an integrated (re)interpretation of the current architectural heritage in Portugal. Keywords: Architectural Heritage; Crypto-History; Architecture; Three-dimensional reconstruction
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INTRODUCTION
Art History can be understood as a field of knowledge that uses multidisciplinary bases, theoretical and methodological, and operational instruments in constant renewal, to understand a given period and its evolution (Serrão 2017, pp. 10–11). In that sense, more than encompassing the description of principles and achievements, it is essential that its research instead focuses on studying and interpreting facts to build a clearer understanding of the events that gave rise to them. History is not about objects […]. What is essential to understanding architecture is the mentality, the mental structure of any given period. The historian’s task is to recreate the intellectual context of a work. (Tafuri 1995, p. 97).
Considering that heritage conservation’s main objective is to analyze, study, identify, preserve, and recognize the works that assume its place as benchmarks in humanity’s evolution over time (Serrão 2001, p. 11). The perpetuity of a given cultural value in the current architectural paradigm depends, in large part, on the ways of representing its inherent identity, which, in architecture, is mainly related to form (Choay 2013, pp. 17–18; Jorge 2003, p. 13). Moreover, despite being renewable and constantly enriching, it is known that
DOI 10.1201/9780429297786-21
cultural heritage tends to be neglected in favor of (often superficial) economic criteria. Moreover, that despises its cultural values while even misunderstanding it and ignoring its usefulness (Serrão 2014, p. 35). Nowadays, the attribution of meaning to an architectural work has followed an essentially representative base, justified by historical reasons that neglect the cultural context in which it was initially inserted. This cultural context concept must be understood in a broader sense. This has often led, over time, to the inevitable destruction or the abandonment of works of patrimonial interest (Serrão 2017, p. 11). As emphasized in the Convention for the Protection of World, Cultural, and Natural Heritage: (…) the cultural heritage and the natural heritage are increasingly threatened with destruction not only by the traditional causes of decay but also by changing social and economic conditions, which aggravate the situation with even more formidable phenomena of damage or destruction (UNESCO 1972, p. 1).
Considering this fact, it becomes of the utmost urgency to work on a heritage valorization strategy capable of continuous changes. Since the entire cultural heritage is a testimony, at one time or another, of a phase of the society in which it was integrated, and often lacks a scientific-analytical process that supports the evaluation of a faded memory (Serrão 2017, p. 10).
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