Brazil's Paulista School

When people think about Brazilian architecture, the first images that come to mind are usually the smooth, white, surfaces of Oscar Niemeyer's Brazilia. His emphasis on sculptural, surreal buildings, artfully composed in the middle of Brazil's desert, became an icon to the world.

Soon after Brazilia was completed, a US-backed military coup installed a military dictatorship in Brazil. At the same time, Sao Paulo became the undisputed financial center of the country. Rampant development swallowed what was left of the old city, creating a place both spectacular and disorientating. The city serves as a case-study for the contemporary explosive urban growth occurring today.

In his book on Brazilian Architecture, Richard William quotes Bernd Witte, a German literary critic, on the condition of Sao Paulo in the 60s and 70s:

"I saw Sao Paulo for the first time from my hotel window, and I have to say that it seemed a city of the dead. Seen from the height of a thirty-story building, the city presents itself to the viewer like an underworld, like a realm of shadows, on which skyscrapers, in their uniformity, appear like tombstones. And when people pass through the city, they see what is unfinished is already falling down."

Out of this world was born the Paulisa School of Architecture. Initially based around the work and teachings of architect Vilanova Artigas, some of the other major talents to emerge from the movement include Bo Bardi, Arquitetura Nova, Carlos Millan, & Paulo Mendes da Rocha. The far-left group championed an "aesthetics of poverty." The most successful works are large public structures formed of concrete and intended to provide space for arts, shows, protests, and new forms of society to emerge.

The project shown above, the FAU-USP pavilion by Vilanova Artigas, was built to look unsophisticed, adopting a "poor" aesthetic, in an attempt to educate the well-off about the life of the downtrodden. If Niemeyer's architecture is about transcendance of the everyday, Artigas' project instead tries to bring us back down to the muddy earth of poverty.

Likewise, the MASP, by Italian immigrant Lina Bo Bardi, provides massive space for gatherings and a public museum above. The project provides one of the few truly public spaces in the center of Sao Paulo and continues to popular.

With the MASP, architecture and superstructure are synonymous. The project renders one simple gesture out of raw concrete and technical daring.

The place is still popular with the public and remains one of the most successful "Modern" public spaces ever created.

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The general project of the Paulista School continues on in the work of Paulo Mendez da Rocha, recent winner of the Pritzker Prize. The Praca do Patriarca, a public pavilion and display area, follows in the formal traditions of Artigas and Bardi.

Structural and architectural ingenuity is simply displayed, with one large post and lintel system that suspends a white canopy. What distinguishes Rocha's work from others is the elegance of his constructs. Over the years, the architect has continued to work and refine Artigas' early project, often stripping it of it's revolutionary rhetoric and focusing on the simple elegance of well-articulated, architectural gestures.

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From housing to museums to stadiums, Rocha conceptualizes with concrete. An elegant play between heavy piers and beams often contrasts with the thinness of steel tendons or window mullions.

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His recent works include urban accupuntures that show respect for historical and urban contexts, an approach unusual for both the Paulista School and the surreal works of Niemeyer and his followers.

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The Pinacoteca do Estado is a beautifully resolved renovation of a historical building into an art museum. Rocha stipped the white paint from the old brick walls, revealing the hidden, textured brick underneath. Black steel walkways puncture the structure at opportune places and connect museum spaces togethor. New skylights look like something Renzo Piano would do, if he was stripped of his high-tech rhetoric.

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Finally, this renovation (above) of an existing church finds the religious past of Brazil gently enclosed and protected by a new concrete superstructure. It is interesting to compare this image to the initial image of this post (showing the revolutionary gathering space of Artigas). Rocha has refined and stepped back from the rhetoric of the early Paulista School, to create more humble, humane public spaces for dwelling.