A Matter of Radiance. The Uzbekistan National Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale

A Matter of Radiance is the official catalogue of Uzbekistan’s participation in the 19th International Architecture Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia. Curated by the GRACE collective, the volume delves into the architectural and scientific legacy of the Sun Heliocomplex in Parkent—an imposing solar furnace built in the 1980s in Uzbekistan, now a symbol of the transition toward a sustainable energy future. The project is part of the Tashkent Modernism XX/XXI research platform, promoted by the Uzbekistan Art and Culture Development Foundation, and offers an interdisciplinary reflection on energy, modernist heritage, and sustainability.

Richly illustrated with archival images and multidisciplinary contributions, the catalogue weaves together critical essays, oral testimonies, and a photographic sequence by Armin Linke that visually explores the Sun Institute complex. The book conveys the site’s ambivalence—utopian and functional, monumental and fragile—while investigating its contemporary potential. More than a mere documentation, the publication serves as a tool for reinterpreting recent heritage, understood not as a static object to be preserved, but as a living infrastructure capable of generating new visions.