Venice Architecture Biennale 2016: Lost in memory

The exhibition, hosted by the Irish Pavilion at this year’s Venice Architecture Biennale, examines the Alzheimer’s Respite Centre in Dublin from the perspective of its occupants. A series of downward-facing projectors creates a tapestry of architectural plans that are drawn and re-drawn to visualise the occupants’ fragmented memories. The installation aims to spark conversation around the lack of architectural designs that cater for this growing demographic.

An accompanying website designed by curators Niall McLaughlin and Yeoryia Manolopoulou enables other architects who are working to help sufferers of degenerative brain diseases to access the research behind the project. The website features a series of interdisciplinary conversations with experts from a diverse range of fields including neuroscience, psychology and philosophy.

‘The general public does not see us. We want to be part of normal society,’ says Helen Rochford-Brennan, Alzheimer’s sufferer and chair of the Irish Alzheimer Society’s National Dementia Working Group.