The Women's House in Africa is a shadow

Women’s House in Africa” is the theme proposed for the 2021 edition of the Kaira Looro competition. The main goal of the competition is to promote gender equality in Africa. This is a continent where, for cultural and religious reasons, women have played a very important role in society and within the family, even though this role has always been overshadowed by men.The themes were sequenced and developed as a veritable architectural crescendo which reaches its climax with the theme of women. Here shadow is seen as the place of “prenatal rest” which, according to Gaston Bachelard, leads us to the mother, i.e. the woman that every individual is drawn towards. The Women’s House in Africa (and not just in Africa if we consider Bachelard’s idea) is always a shadow. The women’s house is a delicate shadow that nourishes the spirit and powers dreams. It is never shut, always open and welcoming and ready to provide that rest where we can all find peace once again. The women’s house is a light shadow, yet lightness in this sense does not refer to the “mbaxana” (which should be light in order not to disturb man) but the lightness described by Calvino which allows us to look at the world from a different perspective, from that of a woman.