Last Friday, on the occasion of International Women’s Day, the Instituto Cultural Rumano presented on the City Hall of Alcobendas (Pl. Mayor, 1, 28100 Alcobendas, Madrid) the exhibition Architecture in Feminine form at the Meeting Courtyard. Vision, memory and creation, which will remain open to the public until next March 24.
Curated by Ileana Tureanu, President of the Romanian Architects’ Union, the exhibition offers a broad view on the contribution of women architects to design, conservation and reinterpretation of the built space from the early twentieth century to contemporaneity. Through a chronological and thematic journey, the exhibition highlights the role progressively conquered by women in a professional field traditionally dominated by men, highlighting both their creative work and their institutional, patrimonial and pedagogical commitment.
The section dedicated to the interwar period includes Queen Maria of Romania, the first female member of the Paris Academy of Fine Arts, a personality recognized for her passion for architecture and for the way she shaped the spaces with which she came into contact, transforming them into expressions of cultural identity and artistic sensitivity. Virginia Haret-Andreescu, the first woman architect of Romania, graduated in 1919; Margareta Brender Rubira, the first woman member of the Catalan College of Architects; and Henrietta Delavrancea -Gibory, whose projects and career paths mark the affirmation of women architects in a restrictive social and professional context.
The post-war period revolves around restorers who played a fundamental role in safeguarding national heritage built, at a historical moment marked by destruction, accelerated transformations and ideological redefinitions. In this context, representative works of the architect Ioana Grigorescu are presented, who restored the splendour to the painted churches of northern Moldova and contributed decisively to their inclusion on the UNESCO World Heritage list.
The contemporary period is represented by a selection of projects carried out by award-winning architects in the latest editions of the National Annual and Biennial Architecture, highlighting the diversity of current practices and openness to new typologies of architectural intervention. Also, special attention is paid to the involvement of young architects in teaching architecture, emphasizing the formative role and responsibility of current generations in transmitting the values of the profession.
The exhibition is organized by the Instituto Cultura Rumano of Madrid, under the auspices of the Embassy of Romania, the Union of Architects of Romania and the City of Alcobendas.