WORKING MODEL

A working model is not the same as a finished model or a model that shows the finished building like a miniture of the real thing. A working model evolves. It influences the idea of the design concept and it is subject to a continuous transformation. Perhaps, a working model and a finished model can be compared to the acts of looking and seeing. The first implies a desire to study and to make a critical comment while the latter seeks to have an image.
In the context of AlzheimUr, the importance of creating a model as a method has proved paramount. It had to be possible to work with a physical material, change it and repeat, subject to new findings during the process of investigation. The first task was to build the mountain in scale. In that way it would be possible to have a sense of the different layers of relationships. To have a feeling for the mountain had from the beginning been an important element for the whole design team. Before starting the design process, the members had met at the roots of the mountain to get familiar with its fragrances, colours, sounds, slopes and paths. (See posts from July 14th). It seemed that the place had its own memories, emerging from the delicate actions that took place in its hills.
The working model is therefore principally about AlzheimUr’s relationship with the mountain, a study of spatial concepts and joints. What is “rational” in relation to a mountain in respect to its topography? One does not have to take for granted that the ethics of the rational is labelled as linear and determinable. Those solutions may be considered “conventient” and “easy” but that definition depends on the one who makes it. The structural element of the landscape is extremely powerful in the search for an equilibrium that the project of AlzheimUr wants to transmit.
In this context, the working model is a way to look at the different paths that curve around the mountain in different layers. Situating oneself on the top of the mountain, the mirador becomes a point of reflection. What is going to take place below in its hills? The modelmaker starts drawing the paths that have already been traced by the team. Observed within this scale, one can see that they lead to others that embrace the mountain continuing along the shoulder and down the arm that give an access to the site. Slowly, the pavilions appear gently making their spaces between the paths. Working physically with the model and evulating critically each step, they find a way to join the structure of the mountain. The centre as a whole that adapts itself to the mountain until becoming the mountain itself, a unique tissue made of nature and programme.
In that process, observation, reflection, and feedback have been terms hovering above the working model, as the memory of the mountain has always been present to verify any decisions.

DEMENTIA UNIT

Due to its role, the centre of dementia is a complex place. It is here where decisions are made, patients are observed and diagnosed and, families are listened to. But, it is as well, a place where different experts meet and exchange and share doubts, ideas and knowledge. The form of dialogue occupies therefore an important part of the day, that is, the TEAM work between families, neurologists, psychologists, neuropsychologists, social workers, geriatrists and nurses.
The typology of this unit shows the specialists’ offices branching out from the central space, which appears as a “street”. It is an internal spine where conversations takes place between professionals. The “street” is a meeting place, where the specialists bring news, construct arguments and provide support to each other. It is a place to read and contemplate, converse and debate. In order to adapt to diverse groups, the meeting tables are arranged along the “street”, different in sizes and intensities, accumulating a variety of experiences as part of the intense investigation that takes place in the whole of AlzheimUr. If once individual work was ever cherished, now group work and research teams are becoming the norm. It even incorporates the international scene as nowadays experts are no longer needed to be physically in the same place. New technologies have changed the way of working.
In the joint search for knowledge, this central space, or street, can be identified as a library, a physical space and an intellectual space where every single story can be found and told through a variety of resources. It is a place that encouraged experiences and where interaction is important in the forms of conversations and debates. The library, which was once a quiet place for individual study, has here become a scenario for dialogues and socialisation. But in contrast to the hectic life of a main street, the library is warm like a living room where hosts and guests engage in conversations and plants form part of the interior by allowing the exterior to enter through the balcony and through the internal courtyards. It is an enriched space which returns the specialists to their more private rooms where they receive patients and their families for more intimate talks in the consulting rooms. These rooms border the mountain so that the patients can walk along a green a balcony that embraces this unit of dementia. A green path that offers a rest and a theme for a conversation looking out towards the orchard while waiting or being close to pine trees that cut across the roof opening the view towards the sky.

BANK OF BRAINS

In a recent visit to the Science Museum in Barcelona, it was impressive to see the different kinds of brains within the animal world, presented like jewellery in their glass cases. Everyone agrees that the brain is a complex organ of thought and reason, as well as controlling many functions. The doctor, Carmen Antúnez, has already showed us images of the human brain in two different stages – of a newborn baby and an adult. (See below A TISSUE OF NEURONS I and TISSUE OF NEURONS II, both posted in July 2006). One is about to start its complex relationship with the world but the other has experienced a great deal on his journey through life.
Bearing this in mind, the question arises: under what conditions do scientists work with the brain? That is, what is their attitude of being observed? How is the brain stored, this precious organ that stores our life history? Undoubtedly, for the researchers at AlzheimUr, the brain represents a key to the future. With it, the scientists keep the hope to find more about the signs and evolution that affects the illness. One could think that the brain’s tissue is a language, still fairly unfamiliar. But what then? What method could be applied? Investigating the brain, are we able to be objective? In Jacque Lacan’s essay ‘The direction of the treatment and the principles of its power’ (1958), he questions the result of the analyst on the basis of “Who is speaking?” Although referring to psychoanalysis, his thoughts make us reflect on how questions are phrased. What is expected from the answer? Working with memories and tracing the past of the patient also raises questions about the connection between the brain and emotions. What makes us burst into tears? And, after crying, can we detect signs in the brain as a proof of that specific reaction?
Understanding the complexity of the brain, the typology of AlzheimUr’s Research Centre is designed in such a way as to stimulate communication and to create links between scientists, ideas and memories, with private and common spaces, crossing views and paths. From their respective research units, the scientists can exchange looks and gestures, crossing the green area that divides them, and observe each other at work; by the wet area, doing manual work or working in the dry area (computers). There is always certain awareness of the other, of collaborating.
Entering the Research Centre, the visitor, on the other hand, immediately feels the presence of their treasure, the BRAINS. This materia prima is stored in the Bank of Brains, which is made of a system of mobile shelving units of high density. The Bank is situated in a spacious and an open reception, with an indirect light that enters through the big windows and internal courtyards. With nature’s presence, the visitor is constantly reminded of life’s cycle and the notion of time. Within this atmosphere that expresses respect and security, the patient’s family is invited to participate in the work of the research and to consider the future donation of the brain to be studied.
With the cooperation and commitment of the family, patients, doctors and scientists, the Research Centre becomes a complex system of connections and with time, dense like the tissue of relationships that composes the nervous system of a mature adult.