Natura Naturans – Coussée & Goris architecten

The concept of natura naturans was used by the philosopher Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677). Loosely translated, it means ‘nature doing what nature does’, i.e. creative nature. Spinoza contrasted this concept with natura naturata, i.e. created nature. Ralf Coussée and Klaas Goris refer to this concept in each representation of their buildings. In doing so they show that the
natural quality of the building material is inherently related to the cultural quality of the design. Natura Naturans offers a look back at what has been achieved and reveals the singularity in the work of COUSSÉE & GORIS architecten. A collection of models displayed like a campo marzio shows a selection of their work from the past decade. On the walls, Marie-Françoise Plissart outlines the use of spatiality in the buildings by means of photographs and film screenings.

For Coussée & Goris, building is an active deed that is indissolubly connected with a well-considered (intelligent) and natural (organic) association with place and space, with light and
shadow, with question (programme) and answer (architectonic result). Each architecture project is on obstacle on earth. For Coussée & Goris, the proper embedding of obstacles possesses
an architectonic value in which each result of construction emanates a logic. Personal in nature and expression, there is always a new incontestability to detect, as though the building had always been there.

The designs are evidence of more than a pragmatic translation from discourse to build reality. For Coussée & Goris, building means the realization of an inherent development, of an obvious thought process and a spatial generosity. Based on both disegno (the design, drawing) and progettare (the act of designing, foreseeing), the architects develop a language of their own, with a clear structure,a recognizable presence and a pronounced volumetry. The architects’ way of thinking fits both in the city and in the country. They constantly question the existing, and this yields a transcendent form of unmistakable professionalism. And while their analyses and reflections are naturans in terms of essential meaning, their buildings become architettura naturata.