Architecture

Mini-CD on Brazilian Architecture

Brazilian Architecture

Brazilian architecture has developed as a result of a complex cultural process and architects, both Brazilian and immigrants, have always contributed to breaking the mould of the hallowed form and style. Architecture has been an expression and instrument for modernization during the Colonial, Imperial and Republican periods. It has enjoyed the support of rulers - from 1808, the King of Portugal, João VI, followed by the emperors Pedro I and Pedro II and later the dictator, Getúlio Vargas up to President Juscelino Kubitschek. It has also merited the support of intellectuals and artists who took part in the Modern Art Week in 1922 in the Salão de 31, in the Cinema Novo in 1960 as well as resisting the military dictatorship during the 1970s and 1980s.

The conditions and main origins of modernity in the configuration of the Brazilian physical-political space were determined by the importance of the part played by the Dutch occupation and in the formation of the cities of Recife and São Luís in the eighteenth century and also by the consolidation in the nineteenth century of the proposals of the French Missionaries in the city of Rio de Janeiro, with the "sagas" of Grandjean de Montigny and Pereira Passos early in the twentieth century.

The setting up of the Imperial Academy of Fine Art and the establishing of regular teaching of architecture in the middle of the nineteenth century encouraged the return of the baroque style - transformed into the rococo style of the Lusitanian inspired colonial phase - and the introduction of official formalism with neo-classicism.

In 1904, the inauguration of Avenida Central, nowadays known as Avenida Rio Branco in Rio de Janeiro, introduced the technique of industrialized production by means of eclecticism. The facades adorned with prefabricated details translate the perceived magic of the immigrants, resulting in hybrid and polyphonic styles typical of the initial republican phase. Also termed historicist and picturesque with features that were neo-classical, renaissance and gothic, with traces of Moorish, Anglo Saxon, Italian and French inspiration, the eclectic buildings are a sign of the internationalization of the Brazilian economy and commerce.

The architecture of the twentieth century was unveiled in São Paulo in 1902 with Vila Pentado by Carlos Eckman and with the construction of the Sorocabana Station in Mairinque, designed in 1907 by Victor Dubugras. The "modern style" that was paraded by Eckman and Dubugras in these and other works had two facets: art nouveau and art deco. These trends were associated with the initial fragmentary and incoherent "modern style", or proto-modernism, multiplied the contradictions of this emerging nation, counterbalancing the craftsman like technique of crystallized creativity with the industrial rationality of mass production.

Introduced by the Portuguese architect Ricardo Severo, the neo-colonial style simultaneously expressed the Luso-Iberian "constants of sensibility". This aversion to foreigners, especially the Portuguese, strongly influenced the forms of the Californian mission style and those of Marajó, classified as being art deco style. The period of transition that continued until the Second World War was characterized by the magical appearance of improvised scenarios and styles, but some experiments with making exceptional stylistic transformations in Rio de Janeiro, were constructed by Italian, English and German contractors using the concepts of the architects Virzi, Moreales de Los Rios, Heitor de Melo, Archimedes Memória, Francisque Couchet and Gastão Bahiana.

The cultural and political hegemony of the Rio-São Paulo axis gave rise to progressionist schemes in those cities to renew the urban and regional physiognomy which spread to the other regions. The continuous urban and architectural modernity is apparent in the transferring of the capital cities from Piauí (to Teresina in 1852) and from Sergipe (to Aracaju in 1855); in the creation of the cities of Belo Horizonte (1894) and Goiânia (1933) and in draft plans for João Pessoa (1932) and Salvador (1945), capitals of the states of Minas Gerais, Goiás, Paraíba and Bahia, respectively.

In 1926, "renewing" urbanism echoed the illuminist Paris of Haussman in the French architect Alfred Agache's scheme for the remodeling and beautification of the city of Rio de Janeiro. At the invitation of the government, Agache introduced into this South American Portugal the classic model of the modern European capital, radically altering the morphology of the previous phases.

The modernist movement phenomenon in Brazilian architecture had its "heroic phase" between 1930-45. During this period, in the course of responding to the needs of expansion and the importing/ exporting of an "architecture of renewal", certain well-known architects put Brazil near the top of the international ranking in the civil construction industry and publicized the standardization of the changing urban spectacle.

The transformation of Brazilian architecture was brought about by the Russian architect, Gregori Warchavchik who had graduated in Milan before being contracted by the Simonsen group at the end of the 1920s to work in the city of São Paulo. The first sign of this transformation was the design and construction of the Modernist House ("Casa Modernista") followed by the publication of his manifesto, Futurismo? as representative of the International Congress on Modern Architecture (CIAM). Classes in architecture at the National School for Fine Art were held under the directorship of the architect Lucio Costa and with whom Warchavchik set up an office in Rio de Janeiro between 1930 and 1932.

The visit by the architect Le Corbusier in 1929 strengthened the resolve of the forward-thinking architects working in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, spreading the ideas of modernist forerunners such as Walter Gropius, Mies Van der Rohe and Frank Lloyd Wright. However, it was only in 1936 when invited to resolve the impasse created in the contest for the headquarters of the Ministry of Education and Health in Rio de Janeiro, that Le Corbusier's proposal defined the "official" idea of modernism, with the upsurge of the Brazilian architectural technique and expression.

"The Ministry building group", comprising Affonso Eduardo Reidy, Carlos Leão, Ernani Vasconcelos, Jorge Moreira, Lucio Costa and Oscar Niemeyer sustained the "heroic period" and paved the way to the leading position occupied in Rio by Costa and Niemeyer, whose careers continued to take a course, both together and individually, that was interspersed with masterpieces. From 1939, with Brazil's Pavilion at the International Fair in New York, until the international tender competition and the construction of the draft plan for Brasília, the new federal capital, built between 1956-60 and including the Pampulha complex, by Niemeyer (Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais) the Hotel do Park São Clemente (Nova Friburgo, Rio de Janeiro) and the Parque Guinle residential complex (Rio de Janeiro) by Costa, were a confirmation of the corbusian ideals and the dialogue between rationalism and organicism on which contemporary Brazilian architecture is based.

The work of Lúcio Costa at the Heritage Department between 1937 and 1960 was in parallel with his position as the personification of the international prestige enjoyed by Brazilian architecture. In Rio de Janeiro this stage was characterized by commissions within the private sector undertaken by Marcelo and Milton Roberto and Henrique Mindlin, whilst in the public sector there were the works of Oscar Niemeyer, Affonso Eduardo Reidy and Carmen Portinho to be followed by Francisco Bolonha and Sérgio Bernardes. In São Paulo, Flávio de Carvalho and other followers of the modern tradition such as Vital Brasil, Rino Levi, Oswaldo Bratke and Vilanova Artigas, undertook other important works, including the Lorena avenue complex, the Esther Building, the Architect's Residence, the Cancer Hospital and the Faculty of Architecture and Planning. In Recife, the notable architects were Luís Nunes and Burle Marx during the 1930s, and Delfim Amorim between 1940-50. Other Brazilian state capitals, for example Salvador, had the benefit of Diógenes Rebouças and José Bina Fonyat, worthy followers of the formalist matrix based on the ideals of Le Corbusier.

Like Warchavchik, the Italian architect Lina Bo Bardi who trained in Milan, set another trend in the transition of styles after arriving in Brazil in 1947. Between 1950 and 1980, in Bahia and São Paulo, Bo Bardi explored the multiplicity of aesthetic solutions for Brazilian architecture by making use of vernacular and rationalist sources as points of reference for his designs for cultural and leisure areas. The Museum of Modern Art in São Paulo, the Solar do Unhão in Salvador and the Sesc-Pompéia in São Paulo demonstrate the progression of the complexity and uniqueness of Brazilian architecture.

The building of Brasília is an example of how cultural and historical limitations can be overcome, leading to the breaking of the so-called aesthetic unit in the field of architecture. The reaffirmation of local identity led to the start of the post Brasília phase, when regional characteristics and differences in materials and building methods began to be seen. In addition, the conflict caused by the increasing density of the central districts of the cities established a need to change the scale of planning schemes and urban design. In parallel, the lack of interest in modernist models and a concern for habitat dominated the work of architects and enabled the development of post modernist, technological and vernacular architectural trends. The use of reinforced concrete vied with metal structures whilst brick and ceramics imposed their tropical colours on the architecture.

In 1969, Lúcio Costa designed the draft plan for the Baixada de Jacarepaguá and the Barra da Tijuca in which he was trying to update the guiding principles of rationalist town planning. Simultaneously, in several Brazilian cities up and down the country, including Minas Gerais and Brasília, examples of architecture in a variety of styles were appearing, with the reassertion of the international style and post modern variations. During that period the heroic tradition was continued by such architects as Joaquim Guedes, Paulo Mendes da Rocha, Ruy Ohtake, Filgueiras Lima, Paulo Casé and Acácio Gil Borso. The modernist movement was represented by Luiz Paulo Conde, Severiano Mário Porto, Franciso de Assis Reis, Jaime Lerner and not forgetting Sérgio Magalhães, Carlos Bratke, Hector Vigllecca and João Castro Filho. These were in addition to Éolo Maia and his partners who were part of the new generation of the Minas Gerais movement, characterized by their constant critical review on the basis of their adoption of universalist and regional values.

by Cêça de Guimaraens