In Vivo

Momentary association

Programme: In 'In Vivo', Bento and Vinciane Despret question our extractivist production system, by identifying and developing construction alternatives using materials derived from living organisms and the imagination that accompanies them. The large-scale installation experiments with natural, living materials, including raw earth and mycelium (the vegetative part of fungi), while the Pavilion catalogue explores our future condition in the light of this little-known universe.

About: How do we think about architecture in a world of finite resources? The "In Vivo" pavilion is based on these reflections. The aim is to re-examine our relationship with the living world through an exhibition that gives pride of place to the local resources of Brussels. Based around a central structure made from a slab of raw earth (from excavated soil), a framework of Brussels beech and a cladding of mycelium panels, the exhibition explores the possibilities offered by mycelium for rethinking our relationship to building and living, both with ourselves and with others. With adjoining rooms dedicated to the process of experimentation and fabrication of the installation created by Bento, the installation is akin to one of the "laboratories of the future" that curator Lesley Lokko has called for this 18th edition. It's a gateway to a different way of making architecture, based on local resources and conducive to the emergence and development of new living materials industries in Belgium and beyond. The catalogue is presented as an anticipation of the advent of the "mycelocene", a new era characterised by the recognition of sponges and their relationship with humans, and takes as its starting point the proposal put forward in 2023 by the Bento architects, looking at the possibilities it opens up.