"Utopias of Common Life" is the Brazilian theme at the Venice Biennale

The Brazilian pavilion at the 17th Venice Architecture Biennale will be guided by the theme " Utopias of Common Life ". Located in the Giardini, the exhibition seeks to map the utopias present on Brazilian soil , from the Guarani worldview of the Land without Evils to the present day, highlighting some moments singular in which transformative ideas have promoted or have the potential to promote significant changes in the way architecture and cities can foster new alternatives for common life . The exhibition is curated by the Minas Gerais-based firm Arquitetos Associados (composed of architects and urban planners Alexandre Brasil, André Luiz Prado, Bruno Santa Cecília, Carlos Alberto Maciel and Paula Zasnicoff), together with visual designer Henrique Penha . The exhibition will be accompanied by a digital catalogue , scheduled for release at the end of June. The exhibition, conceived before the Covid-19 pandemic, takes on new meanings in the current context: "Rethinking forms of coexistence between humans and the planet in ecologically viable and socially inclusive terms seems to be an urgency that is amplified by the collective experience imposed by the pandemic , which reinforces the relevance of the themes that the exhibition seeks to discuss", add the curators.

The exhibition is divided into two sections. The first, called Futures of the Past , is dedicated to two iconic projects of modern architecture, carried out between the end of the Estado Novo and the government of Juscelino Kubitschek, and the utopias that guided them. In this section, The Prefeito Mendes de Moraes Residential Complex (1947), known as Pedregulho, in the northern zone of Rio de Janeiro, is visited through the lens of visual artist Luiza Baldan , who reinterprets the work of Affonso Eduardo Reidy, while the Brasília Bus Station ( 1957), by Lúcio Costa, is the subject of an essay by photographer Gustavo Minas . The second section, Futures of the Present , presents two videos commissioned especially for the exhibition, which reflect on the occupation of contemporary metropolises . One of them, by directors Aiano Bemfica, Cris Araújo and Edinho Vieira, presents the possibilities of reappropriating buildings in city centers. large metropolises , while the second, by director Amir Admoni, poetically reinterprets the idea of appropriating rivers and their banks based on the Fluvial Metropolis project, developed by the research group of the same name at the University of São Paulo. Source: São Paulo Biennial Foundation