1. Álvaro Siza’s ‘Piscina das Marés’, by Mark Durden and João Leal. Leça da Palmeira, Portugal, 2021. Courtesy of the artists

OPEN CALL SOPHIA JOURNAL VOL. 8

Landscapes of care: photography, film, modern architecture and landscape heritage

Abstract deadline (Conference): 1 November 2022

Editors: Hugh Campbell, Mark Durden, Teresa Ferreira, João Leal, Rikke Munck Petersen and Igea Troiani

PT/ENG

Abstract deadline: 1 November 2022

Selected authors will be notified by the 1st of February 2023
Manuscript deadline (Conference): 1 May 2023 International

Conference (dtbc): June 2023Manuscript deadline (Journal): 5 September 2023
Publication date (tbc): by December 2023

Sophia Journal is currently accepting submissions for its third thematic cycle “Landscapes of Care”, addressing contemporary photographic and visual practices that focus on how architecture understood in a wide sense can help to heal a broken planet. The concept of “Landscapes of Care” has increasingly been adopted by diverse areas of study, from health geography to the arts, architecture and heritage preservation. It is used here in order to understand and document modern architecture, building, city and territory as living and inclusive organisms, as well as heritage resources for global sustainability. Modern architecture is a ‘heritage at risk’ as it belongs to a recent past that has not yet been sufficiently recognised by the authorities, scholars and general public. Our aim is to explore the ways in which photography and film can be used as meaningful instruments of research into the socioeconomic, political, historical, technical and ecological dimensions of modern architecture, city and territory.

In this call for papers and visual essays for this 8th issue of Sophia Journal- Landscapes of care: photography, film, modern architecture and landscape heritage– we invite theoretical and field work where architectural photography and filmmaking are descriptive, analytical and interpretive, communicating original perceptions and new understandings of modern architecture and landscapes. Photography and film projects that will allow us to show how modern buildings and landscapes have responded to and reflect the local conditions of their production and importance. Projects which critique and expand our understanding of what constitutes modern architecture and landscape, in terms of its language, locations, functions, creators, patrons and publics.

Photography and film work that can allow us to see the social dimension of architecture and landscape, to understand architecture as Alvar Aalto did, “as a great synthetic process of combining thousands of definite human functions” together with Donna Haraway’s focus on human and non-human interplay — new “naturecultures” to contribute to a greater understanding of modern architecture’s and landscape’s potential for a more ecological and sustainable balance and interplay between architecture and nature.

Some issues of interest that can be taken on board when answering this call are the following:

How photography and film can be used for communicating the way modern architecture, landscape and city forms relate or confront present architectural programs and public spaces and their contemporary public appropriation
What photography and film tell us about the world we inhabit and can be used as a creative process that brings to light new ways of understanding modern architecture and landscape in contemporary urban space, as well as document their cultural significance and heritage values
How photography and film can be used for communicating the way past modern architecture, landscape and city forms relate to or confront present architectural programs, planning and public spaces and their contemporary public appropriation
How photography and film may set forward the idea of an architecture, changing our on-site perception and even turning it into a projected vision in space
The uses of photography and film in identifying, recording and 'unlocking' sites of transformation – i.e. buildings, landscapes, and places, which are undergoing, or will undergo, a process of renewal
Diachronic studies of modern architecture, landscape and planning programs and environments focused on patterns of activities and phenomena aiming at sequentially researching social change, and physical and cultural expressions that may occur during different time lapses
Photographic and filmic series that focus on the perceptive, sensorial and affective experience of modern architecture and landscape in the urban and rural context.

Accepted submissions engage with the issues above in the form of theoretical papers, visual essays, interviews, and critical reviews of publications, exhibitions, and conferences.

The Editorial Team will have the responsibility of doing the first selection of entries (deadline 1st November 2022) and inform the authors (1st December) that to proceed with the call they are expected to deliver the first draft / presentation of their paper (between 3000 to 6000 words) or visual essay (length between 6 to 8 pages, plus text between 500 to 1000 words), by the 1st February 2023.

The entries are then to be sent for review, being theoretical entries peer reviewed and visual essays reviewed by the Editorial Team. Authors are informed of the result of reviews by 1st April. Theoretical papers and visual essays have to be edited in accordance to the reviewers’ comments until the 1st June in order to be presented at the International Conference to be held on that month in connection with the 8th issue of Sophia Journal.

In this way, Sophia Journal brings together each year a diverse group of researchers, architects, visual artists, and curators of international relevance, gathered on its International Conference, in an exercise of joint reflexivity about the intersection between photography and architecture from different perspectives and visual constructs. These international conferences embody an important stage during the process of the annual call and publication of each number of Sophia Journal. This means they enable an active dialogue between researchers, authors and the public, contributing to the identification of new avenues of research and artistic expression related to how photography can be explored as a meaningful instrument of communication, design and inquiry in the world of architecture and today ́s processes of urban change.

The conference will encompass a live and videoconference programme being organised in partnership with the institutions involved.

After the conference authors will be asked to edit their papers or visual essays based simultaneously on the issues raised with the debates that have taken place and the reviewers comments. A new final version for publication will have to be sent for reviewers until the 1st September, 2023 and they can approve the version with no more modification needed or still suggests further small modifications. Final deadline for publication is 1st November and if the paper or visual essay is not uploaded by that deadline, it is not included in Sophia Journal.

Submission instructions

To submit your proposal please send a 500-word abstract (including references and a maximum of five images) and a short bio for each author (up to 70 words each) by the 1st November 2022. Submission of abstracts is done through our OJS platform, by registering and submitting at: https://www.up.pt/revistas/index.php/sophia/index

Selected authors will be notified by the 1st December 2022 that they are expected to deliver the first draft / presentation of their paper (between 3000 to 6000 words) or visual essay (length between 6 to 8 pages, plus text between 500 to 1000 words), by the 1st February 2023.

We apprise you to strictly follow the guidelines that come into view on Sophia Journal platform under "Submission/Refereeing / For Authors".

Authors should visit their profile in Sophia Journal platform to check out the comments andsuggestions from the reviewers to be considered. To check the comments, sign in into the platform with your user and password. Your abstract will show the status “revisions required” until the final version of the paper or visual essay is submitted.

Please note that all theoretical papers will be subject to peer review. The other modalities of submissions we publish (visual essays, interviews and critical reviews) are not subjected to peer review. Acceptance of an abstract in any of these modalities does not guarantee publication.

For guidelines on the submission process and our editorial policies, please visit our website at: https://www.up.pt/revistas/index.php/sophia/about/submissions

For any queries:

Please contact our Editors at info.sophiajournal@arq.up.pt

About Sophia Journal

We are an academic, peer-reviewed journal, published by the Centre for Studies in Architecture and Urbanism (CEAU) / research group Architecture, Art and Image (AAI) at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Porto, Portugal. Created in 2016, Sophia Journal publishes theoretical articles and visual essays that investigate and think critically the intersections between the image and architecture. We understand both terms in a wide sense: the image of photography, painting, drawing, cinema, video, T.V., new media; and architecture as landscape, territory, city, spatiality, built environment.