A laconic title. Behind the cover, an Atlantic scape. Next page, what looks like an attic, delimited by blocks of unfaced concrete. Then a terrace overhanging the garden one perceives to be part of a private house... And so with the next 300 pages: just photographs, the rest is silence. There are experiences that are presented in books, and books that are experiences, and this one is rare. Totally mute, it shows 333 images in no particular order, most in color, others in black and white. General plans, partial views, details. Gray skies, unpopulated places.

In the selection(?) one senses a certain coherence – in the spaces shown and in how they’re shown – but the unease caused by an uncompleted jigsaw puzzle is allayed only by twelve sheets of bible paper bound between larger illustrated pages. They contain texts by a small circle of architect-academics who, reflecting on the book , reveal its purpose. And so we learn that the pictures are of works by young Portuguese practices, all captured by the unifying lens of Francisco Ascensão.

With deliberate visual imperfection the editors have tried to draft the heterodox manifesto of a new generation of professionals. More than a preference for bold forms or pastel tones, what unites them are the country’s recession context and a rejection of their elders’ tired discourses, not to mention concern about the built and its portrayal. Pessoa said that Portugal needed indisciplinarians, so let’s hope that the renewal of its architecture comes through those who betray order with a radically free cumulus of images.