This is the story of Mnemosyne, the story of a ritual, the story of an oracle, and the story of a building in Cervera del Maestre, La Osa Mayor, the backyard of humanity. Above all, it is the story of people. It is the story of building, of living, of civic life in a society constantly threatened by violence and war, a story of remaining human in times of inhumanity.

Memory is nourished by the assertions of the senses and of people. Like it’s descendants morality and ethics, it should be constantly and fundamentally questioned.

As with every story, there is a story before the story. It is the story of the people who lived before on the street Las Parras in the mountain village of Cervera del Maestre. They built the houses, maintained them, used them. They bore children and worked to feed their families. In their free time, they played bowling, sometimes, somehow. Rare were the moments when the beauty of this simplicity was documented. Memory begins when one perceives the moment and becomes aware of its beauty.

At the beginning of April, we invited people again to join the project of LOM. They came and helped to secure the building’s facade and decorate the backyard of humanity with a portal. For this purpose, 42 mosaics were created. Fired clay tiles form the base of these small mosaics.

As the old house structure crumbled, a large pile of rubble, building materials, waste, and earth accumulated. Wooden doors, beams, and other organic material decomposed over the years. This debris was systematically removed. Waste was sorted, and recyclables such as metal and glass were separated (and later recycled). Many building materials were also found in the debris. Almost the entire facade of La Osa Mayor consists of clay tiles that previously formed the walls and ceilings of the house. Now they are part of the facade.

As a social art project, La Osa Mayor is always a magnet for people. They want to reorient themselves, explore different value systems and simply enjoy the little things in life. Experiencing personal happiness in community environments is more intense. This is part of the project in the open garden of La Osa Mayor as it is as well in our living community. And it’s only natural that this feeling arises during the creative process itself.

An open art project brings together people from different hemispheres of the world. The shared desire to work on a large, collaborative project builds bridges and breaks down language barriers. Understanding the materials is incredibly helpful in grasping the moment and its meaning.

From the outset, one goal of this project was to create space for people. This includes the space for spending time in the patio. But it also encompasses the spaces in the niches and corners, the platforms and chambers, that will be available to visitors. How often do people stand in the streets of the town, looking at the facades and wondering what the interiors of these buildings look like? La Osa Mayor will foster this desire to connect with the place where one is. There should always be something new to discover.

La Osa Mayor lies on the road of the vineyards. In the past, wine was also fermented in large, bulbous bottles. Many farmers had a few vines at the edge of their fields. Grapes were dried into raisins or placed in these glass containers.

Forgetting is the prerequisite for remembering.

The green bottle on the facade is a reminder of this tradition. In the mornings and evenings, it captures the sunlight and casts a soft glow inside one of the numerous chambers.

Almost twenty years ago, we opened the gallery in CASAdelDRAGON. Visitors saw many works by contemporary artists from all over the world in rotating exhibitions. While some guests inquired about the stories behind the artworks, the true art lovers—and potential buyers—were rather quiet and didn’t want to know much about the pieces themselves. They found resonance in contemplating the art with their own personal stories. These stories had long resided within them, and the artwork brought them to the surface anew. We want to approach this particular stone in the same way. It has its own story, and that story is far more than just our own. It’s the potential for all the stories of the viewers. Here, too, it’s important to leave space, space for the stories of others.

Construction site logistics is a recurring challenge. On the one hand, the workspace must not be cluttered with materials, while on the other hand, the distance to the installation site should be short. Furthermore, delivery, preparation, and final use as building material must be constantly coordinated. Often, only a very small number of people work on the construction site each week from Monday to Friday. In such cases, it’s crucial that all materials have been stacked as high as possible for easy access. This is another reason why every space in the facade is frequently used as temporary storage.

Those who bomb girls’ schools or student dormitories, or who tacitly condone bombing, shouldn’t be surprised that a “lost generation” feels “lost.” How can one find their way in a world that is currently disintegrating and populated by people who are driving, supporting, accepting, or ignoring this deconstruction? Where is the support, the courage to gain clarity about one’s abilities and goals? When Dilan secures the scaffolding on the facade, it’s informal learning. But it’s much more than that. It’s the beginning of self-empowerment, of securing and developing one’s living space. In the photograph, it’s just a moment. But it’s history, connected to this building, for a long time to come.

Human development is linked to the desire to expand one’s senses and physical capabilities. The search for, construction of, and use of tools has always been an expression of the will to create. In the creative process, the visible result is what ultimately remains. The tools disappear from the scene of the action, and thus the question arises: How could this have been built like that?

The facade underscores the significance of this place. Only people themselves can celebrate humanity. And they cannot be forced to do so. It is a free, perhaps spontaneous act. And it is certainly an act that will continually reinvent itself and its expression in the times to come.

If we are to make ourselves equal to others, we should probably start with forgetting.

Just as the dragon of CASAdelDRAGON gazes northward over the oranges and the power of water in the earth as an allegory, so this facade welcomes the visitor and draws their attention to the fact that something significant is possible if the visitor is ready for it. The height suggests the magnitude of the moment.

Every Saturday morning we erected the scaffolding, which is four meters high and three meters wide. And every Saturday or Sunday evening we dismantled it again so as not to block the street during the week. After the first mosaics were in place, we found it challenging to have to wait another week before we could gain again height to continue the work.

This week we spent more time working on the inner part of the facade, salvaging building materials from the rubble and preparing them for the coming weekend. It’s truly a very satisfying and peaceful task to be able to build such a Gothic arch in such a place.

Repression imprisons, forgetting liberates.

And it’s a great privilege to be able to use such old building materials. Stones that were once part of the Cervera del Maestre castle complex found their way into the Osa Mayor building, and a few hundred years later they were lost in the rubble of the ruins. Now they are returning to the light of day, gleaming in the morning sun. An old cycle is ending, a new one is beginning.

The statics of a stone arch depend on the keystone. It connects the two sides and distributes the forces evenly. When the roof truss of a house is completed, it’s a cause for celebration. We always celebrated when we could lay one of these keystones. The Japanese loquat in the patio La Osa Mayor looks on, hinting at the beauty of this project when the plants and animals will populate the backyard.

Francesca is painting the old wooden beams. They came from a demolition on the same street. The 250-year-old beams were given to us just when we needed a technical solution for connecting the facade above the balcony exit. The beams are extremely strong. Woodworm has no chance in the hard heartwood. The coat of oil protects the wood from moisture penetration.

Days earlier, we had built a support for the beams. This support also consists of clay tiles salvaged from the ruin’s rubble. The interior was filled with “Roman concrete” to distribute the load evenly across the surface.

Our neighbors had told us about an old woman who often went out onto her balcony to watch the children playing in the street. The lintel above the balcony had collapsed. We had endured this wound in the facade for a long time, and it was a great joy to restore this connection.

Every small construction phase requires a solid technical solution for the facade’s structural integrity. But every small phase also offers the chance for a new and interesting detail, another sign of appreciation for the project, a gift to the village, to its people. After screwing a layer of sheathing between the beams, we were able to seal the surface with the paper from old mortar bags.

We poured sand onto the paper and formed a small hill. This reminds me of another story. As a little boy, I discovered how to make my sandcastles on the playground more durable. I got some cement from the nearby construction sites, mixed it with the sand, and moistened it. I was delighted with the quality of my creations, but the other children’s parents weren’t so pleased.

Anyone who shakes the dust off their clothes before entering my house might as well put their memory aside.

We stuck stones from the riverbed into the sand. This, too, is a reference to water, which permeates us as human beings and, as a medium, holds our memories.

By the end of May 2026, it was already possible to see where the Osa Mayor’s journey would lead. Thirty-three small mosaics had found their place in the facade, and the upper arch was complete with its keystone. Morning and evening, the sun shone into the street, bathing the facade in a special light. We are grateful to be a part of it. We are grateful to be part of this story. And we perceive it as our own story, a story of humanity.

Mnemosyne is the daughter of Heaven (Uranus) and Earth (Gaia). She is the goddess of time and the goddess of memory. She bore Zeus the nine muses, conceived during nine nights of love. Mnemosyne is also the guardian of the oracle of the underworld. In this oracle, a ritual is offered to the supplicant.

According to Pausanias, the priests do not lead the supplicant directly to the oracle, but instead to two nearby springs. There, he must drink the water from the springs. He first drinks the water of Lethe, the water of forgetfulness. Thus, he forgets everything he knows and has thought about until now. He becomes empty for the next step. Then he drinks the water of Mnemosyne, the water of memory. This allows him to remember everything. The priests then seat him on Mnemosyne’s chair, which stands near the sanctuary, and question him while he sits there about everything he has seen or experienced. The priests hand the petitioner over to Tyche and Daimon Agathon. Later, his relatives care for him until he regains his senses.

The common good is common resource.

In La Osa Mayor, there will one day be two fountains commemorating Mnemosyne and her oracle. Whoever passes through the entrance of La Osa Mayor accepts that they will become equal to all who have passed through it before them. This also includes letting go of one’s own memories to make room for shared remembrance.

Anyone who can look the children of their time in the eye without shame or fear is doing something right. That is the motivation.