Latin American Architecture

In architecture, as in much of the rest of its culture, Latin America offers at once a coherent regional ethos and great national individuality. The common history, common role in the world, and common destiny architects probably face justify their efforts to create a continental identity in the major countries of Latin America.Latin American Architecture profiles architects from six of the major countries -- Argentina, Colombia, Chile, Mexico, Uruguay, and Venezuela -- six voices "speaking" for the region. The essays capture the political and social changes that have altered the face of Latin American countries and show how these architects continually attempt to balance the old with the new, intimating at the same time the continuity and cultivation of a tradition so persistent in Latin American architecture. In doing so, the artists reveal the two major schools of development: minimalist and tectonic tradition.This handsomely illustrated book focuses on prominent figures in Latin American architecture. A critic from each country profiles the work of a representative architect of that nation: Colombia's Rogelio Salmona, Mexico's Ricardo Legorreta, Venezuela's Jesus Tenreiro-Degwitz, Uruguay's Eladio Dieste, Chile's Christian De Groote, and Argentina's Clorindo Testa.Taken together, the studies in this volume correct an imbalanced treatment of the region's architecture at the hands of recent international critics, who lauded Latin America as the proving ground of modernism in the late 1940s but then quickly lost interest.A refreshing look at some less-famous architects, whose skill is equal to if not greater than that of some stars of the "developed world", Latin AmericanArchitecture provides an ideal introduction for the architecture student or anyone else interested in architecture as a reflection of culture.