We meet up with the Sevillian architect at the Reina Sofía National Museum in Madrid, where she created the interior exhibition space for ‘Audiosphere. Experimenting with Sound, 1980-2020′ one of the museum’s most successful exhibitions this year. The atmosphere created by Marta Pelegrín complements this awakening of the senses perfectly. The layout, with sofas and ergonomic units, invites you to lie back and listen, relaxed and serene. In successive rooms, the lighting modulates and deflects the attention.

Her architectural and interior design vision is based on a deep and sensitive exploration of the social and natural ecosystem. So it follows that the pieces created for the interior design of the exhibition will be recycled by the museum.

Marta Pelegrín co-founded the Mediomundo Arquitectos studio with Fernando Pérez. It is a personal project that began after she worked at Cruz y Ortiz Arquitectos studio, where she collaborated on various projects, including leading the New Rijksmuseum project in Amsterdam.

She has extensive teaching experience. She’s an associate professor in the Projects Department of Malaga and Seville’s Architecture Schools, and teaches on the Master’s degree in Sustainable Cities and Architecture at the University of Seville, and the Master’s degree in Renewable Energies: Architecture and Urban Planning. The Sustainable City at the International University of Andalusia.

Galery of photos

The Macarena Cybercentre in Seville is one of her most renowned projects. This is a social hub which has led to social improvements in the local area. Another of her most well-known projects is the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Granada. And most recently she’s worked on the interior design of a renovation at the Banco de España, with the aim of creating spaces for a new exhibition room for the bank’s collection.

October 2020 saw the opening of the ‘Audiosphere. Experimenting with Sound 1980-2020’ exhibition at the MNCA Reina Sofía, housing more than 700 works of sound creation and experimental music.  This isn’t an exhibition of objects, but rather hundreds of works of sound art that welcome prolonged and in-depth listening.

In the interview, Marta Pelegrín reveals her process of experimentation and development in the work she carried out:

“Adapting the third floor spaces of the Sabatini building was about encouraging listening, to explore another way of relating to works based on intangible sounds. The layout isn’t about a concept of space, but attitude. The layout is as much about the action as the effect of encouraging you to listen, aptitude and attitude. A way of doing, of listening”, the architect explains to Lifestyle Porcelanosa.

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Making the video and presentation: Marisa Santamaría

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