em construção / under construction

em construção / under construction, 2025

Pigmented precast concrete, galvanised steel and mass vegetation / 16 x 11 x 10 m approx. cm



em construção / under construction creates a space between construction and demolition. It is characterized by a tension between abstract and concrete and takes as its starting point an obsolete concrete construction, whose reuse is a way of dealing with the remnants of what was left unbuilt.

Fernanda Fragateiro began with a process of abstraction of planes and surfaces that are fixed to a metal structure, used as a grid, where a complex interaction of vertical, horizontal and diagonal lines develops. This structure is the place for the deconstruction of a wall that appears fragmented in space, like a ruin under construction, in a process that is the reverse of disappearance. A set of concrete panels, collapsing onto metal beams, reveals rhythms and visual relationships that remind us of the ruins of buildings and cities, whose traces of a lost past surround and shape us.

The sculpture is definitely constructed as a ruin and establishes a process of deconstruction, but it is intended as a place for the flourishing of new forms and new ways of life, in a deliberate strategy to compensate for the catastrophe. Although it conveys an image of instability and collapse, this work exists under the sign of lightness.

All construction is the beginning of ruin. All memory is ruin. The construction of ruins or building upon ruins acts as a backdrop for work
and power, where the past fertilises the present.

The sculpture, in its permanent and fixed state, acts as an anchor in the forest area of Campus DST. Around it, the terrain is shaped, a meadow is planted and a subtle amphitheatre is installed as a place to linger and contemplate. In contrast to the permanence of the sculpture, the surrounding space is all impermanence and change, open to being contaminated by the passage of time and by use.