XXXIII. CHINAMPA VENETA 

For the 19th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale, the collective Chinampa Veneta presented a staging of chinampas in the Arsenale and a floating chinampa in the Venetian lagoon, as an analogue to Rossi’s Teatro del Mondo. With more than 4,000 years of history in the Valley of Mexico, chinampas are man-made rectangular plots composed of organic matter, placed in shallow lakes. Their perfectly geometric arrangements create water canals that multiply along the shores of the lake.

The varying sizes of these canals provide ecological niches that lead to an explosion of life. Each element of the system is equally important and mutually dependent — a symbiotic relationship that fosters life, captures carbon, purifies water, and produces food and oxygen. The chinampa system shows us a resilient path to follow in a world on the brink of climate collapse.

As a collective of designers, architects, landscape architects, and cultivators from Mexico City, we have found that the chinampa system of Xochimilco is an example of design that embraces all the elements of the path toward regeneration. It integrates water, soil, sunlight, and all species as design components, recognizing their roles as living and mutually beneficial actors.

We admire the resilience of the chinampa and, as creatives, we envision the possibilities of designing futures where nature’s life cycles become a symbiotic part of our built environment.