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In 2012 I started two
large photographic essays on the aqueduct of Lisbon, with thousands
of images. At the same time, the physician, friend and photographer
Miguel Ribeiro also held a great photo essay about this magnificent
building. We both were guided by our dear friend Margarida Ruas, one of the leading experts in the world on the
secrets of this fabulous building of the early eighteenth century.
My photo essays are dedicated to her.
The aqueduct of Lisbon, also known as Free Waters' Aqueduct,
is one of the largest buildings in the world, with an extension
of fifty-eight kilometers (thirty-six miles) through beautiful
rooms, hallways, lobbies - all built in stone. Its design followed
the mystical secrets of European culture, the same which formed
the souls of Mozart, Borromini, Piranesi and Claude Debussy among
so many others.
The aqueduct survived untouched to the terrible earthquake of
1755 that destroyed much of the city, killing thousands of people.
Voltaire was deeply impressed with the violence of that natural
disaster.
With eight thousand and eight hundred and fifty kilometers long
(five thousand and five hundred miles) and about forty thousand
towers, the fabulous Wall of China undoubtedly is the largest
building ever. On the other hand, the aqueduct of Lisbon has
an architectural refinement that transcends its original function.
One of my photo essays was titled The Phantom of the Aqueduct
and the other one, The Free Waters's Mystery. A fragment of the
latter, in black & white, is now published in book, in two
editions, one in Portuguese and other in English.
Margarida Ruas intensely works for this wonderful building become
a UNESCO World Heritage Site. And it should be. Only in the late
twentieth century the human being was able to create buildings
of this size, probably not as huge, surely not as durable as
it is, and never as an architectural design. Such huge buildings
of the twentieth century are species of large warehouses, objects
of engineering and therefore without such an aesthetic quality.
Entering in the Free Waters' Aqueduct is to dive in the sacred
geometry, in the Enlightenment thought that, contrarily to what
is sometimes said, was very dedicated to the discovery and to
the occult - as in Kepler, Pascal or Newton. A historical period
devoted to a mystical universe that would be disintegrated by
the mechanical culture of the nineteenth century, but whose principles
would be recovered in the early twentieth century by quantum
physics, by the phenomena of "emergency" and autopoiesis,
and by the cyber-universe of René Berger among others,
offering us a new dimension to the principle we enigmatically
call "mystery".
The recognition of the aqueduct of Lisbon as a World Heritage
Site is the best way to preserve for future generations this
fabulous building - which is now threatened.
The book with a hundred photos of this enigmatic and fabulous
building, many of them made in places rarely visited, is - like
my other books - at cost price and can be ordered at http://www.asa-art.com/edmp/dstr/index/amazon/books.html.
Independently of the book I think that everyone who believes
in the humanity and are focused on the future, on discovery,
should sign the petition here - http://peticaopublica.com/pview.aspx?pi=P2013N71257 - and spread to as many friends
as possible the urgency in saving one of most interesting and
little-known human masterworks that is, by itself, heritage of
humanity.
Emanuel
Dimas de Melo Pimenta, 2013
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