Ângela Ferreira: Maison Tropicale / Museion Bolzano Bozen, Italy / Interview

The new museum for modern and contemporary art, the Museion Bozen Bolzano, Italy, openend its doors with the inaugural exhibition “Peripheral Vision and Collective Body” which is on display from May 21 until September 21, 2008. Taking part in this group show is also Portuguese artist Ângela Ferreira with her work “Maison Tropicale“. The project was the official representation of the Portuguese Pavilion at 52nd International Art Exhibition La Biennale di Venezia. The installation Maison Tropicale is now the estate of Museion Bozen. VernissageTV met with Ângela Ferreira at the occasion of the opening of the Museion. In this video she talks about the idea behind this project.
To give you some background information: Ângela Ferreira’s Maison Tropicale reflects on colonial history and its contemporary, post- and neo-colonial resonances. Amidst the territorial reorganisation undertaken by the colonial powers in Africa after World War II and following a public tender process, the French Overseas Ministry, through collaboration with the French designer Jean Prouvé, saw the possibility to further develop modernist ideas of conceiving a series of aesthetically sophisticated homes, that could be mass-produced and that would give people greater access to well-designed, high quality architecture based on prefabricated aluminium modules. Prouvé’s ideas never took hold in Europe, but the possibility to install a large number of his houses in the African colonies led to the development of his Tropical House. Of the thousands of units originally envisaged, only three prototypes ultimately left Prouvé’s workshop. In 1949, the first Tropical House was transported by plane to Niger and installed in the capital, Niamey. Two other houses were transported to the Congo and installed in Brazzaville in 1951. Museion Bolzano Bozen, Italy, May 24, 2008.

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