The show "Catalonia in Venice_Water Parliaments: Projective Ecosocial Architectures", created and curated by Eva Franch i Gilabert, Mireia Luzárraga, and Alejandro Muiño, and organized by the Institut Ramon Llull, tackles the water crisis from a cultural, political, and ecosocial perspective. 

The exhibition was opened by Sònia Hernández Almodóvar, the Catalan Minister of Culture, and Pere Almeda, the director of the Institut Ramon Llull.

Image © Jose Hevia

The 19th International Architecture Exhibition is currently hosting its preview days in Venice. The exhibition will open to the public on 10 May and will be on view until 23 November 2025 at the Giardini, the Arsenale and various venues in Venice, Italy. 

As part of the 19th International Architecture Exhibition, Catalonia in Venice—Water Parliaments: Projective Ecosocial Architectures—opened in Venice this Thursday. Alejandro Muiño, Mireia Luzárraga, and Eva Franch propose a perspective on architecture as a means of critical thought and group action.

Image © Jose Hevia

Eva Franch emphasized that "we want to offer spaces for possibility and community empowerment that contribute to social, political, and ecological responses,” and added: “If we are water and everything around us is architecture, then all architecture is water."

Alejandro Muiño stressed that their project does not approach water solely as a resource but as a political subject, while Mireia Luzárraga highlighted the opportunity it provides to map and integrate water-related issues from across the globe.

Image © Jose Hevia

Through four essential elements, Catalonia in Venice_Water Parliaments: Projective Ecosocial Architectures offers architecture as a platform for thought and design at various scales as well as activism:

The Future Labs: The opinions of scientists, artists, farmers, and activists have been collected through interdisciplinary workshops that have been hosted throughout Catalonia, the Balearic Islands, and the Valencian Community. In order to examine current and potential future scenarios for sustainable water usage and multispecies coexistence, these workshops collectively highlighted both individual and transversal issues. 

The art displayed at the Biennale Architettura 2025 is based on the creative strategies that have been imagined by bringing local expertise to the forefront.

Image © Flavio Coddou

The Exhibition: A water parliament has been created out of a disused naval construction area. The seven topics that frame the case studies in the show are introduced in a brief film at the entrance. 

Following the screening, seven pieces that promote critical discourse, urgent thought, and active engagement from communities, architects, and policymakers are housed inside the building's structure on a suspended tensile fabric membrane. The area is transformed into a continuously changing atmosphere by periodic fog cycles.

Image © Flavio Coddou

The ATLAS of Water Architectures Open Call: The project's core is this. Architects, artists, scholars, independent researchers, activists, institutions, and organizations from all around the world are invited to submit constructed, hypothetical, or innovative concepts that challenge and rethink how we all relate to water. 

By discussing these ideas, ATLAS hopes to promote worldwide cooperation and educated discussion in the direction of more sustainable water futures. The project seeks to create a critical, international archive that prioritizes ecosocial viewpoints, honors practices that subvert prevailing paradigms, and offers revolutionary ideas for architecture and water management.

Image © Flavio Coddou

"100 Words for Water: A Vocabulary" is a book that Thinkers, scientists, activists, philosophers, and architects from all over the world have joined forces to develop a conceptual toolkit that reinterprets our connection with water in light of the increasing ecological urgency of the situation. Words actively shape the world in addition to describing it. 

Language is the foundation of all architectural concepts and cultural transformations; new words are created when preexisting ones are insufficient to convey emerging realities. 

The magazine, which is published by Lars Müller and jointly supported by the Architects’ Association of Catalonia (COAC) and the Institut Ramon Llull, is edited by curators Eva Franch i Gilabert, Mireia Luzárraga, and Alejandro Muiño.

Image © Flavio Coddou

Next year, Water Parliaments will be part of the exhibition at the 2026 World Congress of Architects of the International Union of Architects (UIA) in Barcelona (Spain).

Catalonia and the Balearic Islands' participation in the Eventi Collaterali of La Biennale di Venezia is produced and coordinated by the Institut Ramon Llull. The region has participated in the Art Biennale since 2009 and the Architecture Biennale since 2012. The idea to be presented is chosen by a new group of experts every year.

Image © Flavio Coddou

"The exhibition exemplifies contemporary Catalan architecture, which is dynamic, rooted in its territory, and engaged with present challenges. It starts from a local approach to address global issues such as the climate crisis, the management of natural resources, the right to housing, environmental justice, and the memory of places, contributing to imagining fairer, more sustainable, and respectful futures," said The Catalan Minister of Culture, Sònia Hernández Almodóvar. 

"For his part, the director of the Institut Ramon Llull, Pere Almeda, remarked that “this is a very ambitious project that integrates a multidisciplinary perspective and aims to be a catalyst for the changes we need." 

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Image © Flavio Coddou

Almeda added, "this year, the Catalan presence at the Venice Biennale is exceptional, and we are very proud to contribute a unique voice to this internationally significant platform."

Find out all exhibition news on WAC's Venice Architecture Biennale page. 

Project facts

Graphic Design: Arauna + Paratext

Project: Water Parliaments, Eva Franch i Gilabert, Mireia Luzárraga & Alejandro Muiño.

The top image in the article © Flavio Coddou. 

All images © José Hevia, Flavio Coddou, César Segarra, Institut Ramon Llull.

> via Institut Ramon Llull

Balearic Catalan exhibition pavilion Venice Architecture Biennale