The false antagonism between matter and memory

Conservation and demolition are two opposite actions which usually refer to the materiality of the work of architecture. However, often and even more frequently demolition occurs also by adding rather than subtracting, that means preserving the matter of the work, but destroying its intangible values. This scenario emerges in a period, such as the current one, in which the re-use of pre-existing architectures seems to be the only way to guarantee their preservation, often foreseeing the entering of inappropriate uses, furthermore favouring design solutions aimed at their spectacularization. It is, indeed, a false antagonism between matter and memory, which can be solved, in the design phase, by studying a balance between them, without favouring one at the expense of the other. Starting from these assumptions, the aim is to reflect on the large urban buildings created to host functions linked to the issue of pain, such as prisons, hospitals, asylums, and to evaluate how to act on them in the process of re-use, through projects that respect the original ‘spirit’ of places.