Itamar Bench By Pedro ÁVila

Rooted in a personal recollection, the bench draws from the Palácio do Itamaraty in Brasília, Oscar Niemeyer’s brutalist landmark. As a child, Ávila observed its colonnades from the window of a public office, a recurring image that now materializes in wood and metal. The repetition of vertical elements echoes the building’s monumental rhythm, while the hand-carved texture disrupts the rigidity of its architectural reference. The modular bench emerges as both object and gesture, an exploration of memory, architecture, and material presence. Composed of seven wooden columns that function as individual seats when apart and form a unified whole when interlocked, the piece exists between fragmentation and cohesion. A sculptural bronze cylinder secures its structure, reinforcing the tension between autonomy and collectivity.This bench is composed of independent modules, produced using the stack lamination technique, in which wooden boards are stacked, pressed, and later sculpted with a saw. The joining system between the modules is achieved through cylindrical bronze rods inserted vertically.