Brazil´s Modern Architecture, by Elisabetta Andreoli and Adrian Forty (Phaidon, 2004), testifies to Brazil’s relevance in today’s debates around architecture, regionalism, large-scale urban growth and wider cultural issues.
From the 1930s to the 1960s, Brazilian modern architecture was the ‘envy of the world’, according to English historian Reyner Banham. Having been at the centre of the international scene, the subject of a major exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and special issues by almost every architectural journal, it nevertheless slowly declined in prominence after 1964. However, the spirit of creative experimentation that characterized Brazilian pioneers lived on, and is demonstrated today by a plethora of recent work that is once again placing Brazil firmly within the map of the architectural world.
This book is the most comprehensive survey and analysis of Brazilian modern architecture to date, written by a young generation of Brazilian architects and historians for an international audience. Examining the works from the ‘inside’, and with different critical perspectives, they offer new and compelling readings of the country’s architecture. Discussing the works of Oscar Niemeyer and Lucio Costa, as well as those by less known but equally respected architects such as Affonso Eduardo Reidy, Vilanova Artigas and Jorge Machado Moreira, they show how modernist ideals were incorporated into a country with a legacy of contrasts and contradictions. The nation that saw the creation of Brasilia, one of the most utopian projects of the Modern Movement, also witnessed the formation of its built environment at one of the fastest rates in the world, while large parts of the population still lived in precarious accommodation.
Charting post-Brasilia developments, Brazil’s Modern Architecture describes how architects today have adapted to the conditions of an increasingly polarized society by developing new strategies that are no less creative, even if sometimes less demonstrative. Profusely illustrated with drawings, historical black and white, and new colour photographs, it also portrays the recent works of young practices, such as MMBB Arquitetos and Una Arquitetos, through a series of case studies.
– Elisabetta Andreoli and Adrian Forty, Brazil´s Modern Architecture (Phaidon, 2004), book description
The text is in English. The book is lavishly illustrated with photographs and architectural drawings.
Our copy is in very good condition. The pages are clean; no markings except for the previous owner’s signature on the back of the front cover. The binding is fine. The dust jacket has some minor edge wear and shows some small signs of shelf wear.
