You is probably not immediately aware of the identify Carmen Portinho, but her work stands out. Perched imperiously on the hill that provides it its identify, the Pedregulho housing complicated rises like a modernist temple. Its luxurious, sinuous type cuts a dynamic determine in opposition to the in any other case countless city sprawl of Rio de Janeiro’s São Cristóvão neighbourhood.
Pedregulho’s undulating 260-meter-long predominant block curves elegantly alongside the contours of the panorama, making a spotlight of socially aware structure in Brazil, or the tropical modernist structure equal of the Acropolis. Unprecedented for a social housing block, architect Affonso Reidy’s bold masterpiece is unlikely to be repeated.
But past the revolutionary design that’s attribute of Reidy’s work, it embodies one thing else: the revolutionary imaginative and prescient of engineer and concrete planner Portinho, his companion till he handed in 1964. Whereas Reidy obtained the plaudits for Pedregulho, it was his formidable companion who reworked Brazilian modernism from behind the scenes, difficult each assumption about how society may very well be formed by way of its structure.
Carmen Portinho at MAM Rio
(Picture credit score: Foto Arquivo – Agência O Globo)
Carmen Portinho and Affonso Reidy: a partnership that formed Brazilian modernism
Portinho’s relationship with Reidy, from the Forties to his passing in 1964, proved transformative for Brazilian structure. Whereas he offered visionary designs from his time finding out in France, she was impressed in her function as the pinnacle of Rio’s Division for In style Housing by the dramatic modifications to social housing she witnessed being applied in post-war England.
‘What an incredible couple. They have been speaking about urbanism, structure, engineering, and artwork in the lounge. Dreaming of the modifications they may result in to Brazil,’ says Jose Guimaraens, assistant curator for an exhibition that seeks to shine the highlight on Portinho’s outstanding profession, at the moment on show at one other of their marvellous achievements, the Museum of Fashionable Artwork in Rio de Janeiro.
Their collaboration at Rio’s Division for In style Housing challenged conventional notions of what was attainable within the constructed atmosphere, paving the best way for Brazilian modernism and its outstanding synthesis of worldwide ideas with native situations. Portinho’s technical experience, managerial talent, political savvy and private charisma have been important to reworking Reidy’s visionary designs into actuality for hundreds of working-class Brazilians.
Pedregulho: a masterpiece that redefined social housing
‘Pedregulho was the masterpiece,’ says Guimaraens. ‘[With it] they’re exhibiting the poorest folks in society that the federal government may provide the identical home as a wealthy particular person.’
Constructed between 1948 and 1960, Pedregulho represented a radical departure from standard social housing. Whereas most initiatives targeted on maximising models at minimal price, Portinho dared to think about that Brazil’s working-class deserved magnificence, artwork, and neighborhood amenities sometimes reserved for the elite. The complicated featured beautiful azulejo tile murals by celebrated artist Candido Portinari and one other mural for the college by Roberto Burle Marx.
Constructed for native authorities workers to place them inside half-hour of their administrative center, the complicated was formed with high-quality supplies and got here with complete neighborhood amenities, together with a faculty, well being centre, swimming pool, and communal laundry designed to liberate girls from family drudgery.
‘If you happen to evaluate Pedregulho with Parque Guinle by Lúcio Costa, Parque Guinle was constructed for the higher class in Rio. Even Parque Guinle does not have Portinari panels,’ notes Guimaraens, highlighting the social mission’s unprecedented high quality.
Structure as social transformation
This wasn’t simply structure—it was social transformation and, importantly for the fiercely feminist Portinho, empowering girls by way of design. In her time on the head of Rio’s Division of In style Housing, Portinho refused to compromise on high quality, preventing for what she known as ‘dwelling areas, not simply flats.’
‘The initiatives of the Division of In style Housing have been housing with varied makes use of, not solely the residence, but in addition faculties, leisure, artwork,’ explains Aline Siquiera, curator of the exhibition. ‘A mission like Pedregulho introduced with it the concept every part it is advisable to stay on this house, you may have moments of enjoyment and leisure, and that’s a part of your private home, it belongs to you, and society.’
The complicated even got here with a regulatory information educating residents tips on how to stay in fashionable areas, reflecting the period’s perception that structure may educate, empowering girls of their every day lives by decreasing time misplaced to every day chores. But Pedregulho’s revolutionary method was each its triumph and limitation. The mission’s bold scope made it costly and troublesome to copy at scale.
View of the exhibition Desenho industrial 70 on the Bienal Internacional do Rio de Janeiro, as a part of Portinho’s work, seen on the MAM Rio present
(Picture credit score: Fotografia, sem autoria identificada, 1970. Coleção Silvia Steinberg)
Just one different mission comparable in scope — the Minhocao of Gavea — was accomplished throughout Portinho’s time on the Division of In style Housing. Two different initiatives, Vila Isabel and Paquetá, with comparable lofty ambitions, have been solely partially accomplished. Even the weekend residence she shared with Reidy from 1952 was designed as a mannequin residence to be replicated by anybody who wished to construct their very own place into the steep terrain of Rio de Janeiro. Sadly, although the designs have been made obtainable for anybody to make use of, no one did.
Portinho’s optimistic imaginative and prescient for Brazilian social housing light when confronted with a political shift that meant Rio de Janeiro’s favelas we relocated to locations just like the Cidade da Deus suburb at across the identical time as Pedregulho was being accomplished.
Contributors on the Congresso Internacional Feminista on a visit at Recreio dos Bandeirantes – as seen within the MAM Rio exhibition
(Picture credit score: Fotografia, sem autoria identificada, [jun.] 1931. Arquivo Nacional)
Constructing Brazil’s cultural id at MAM Rio
Dejected however unfaltering, Portinho went on to channel her power to rework the fortunes of the Museum of Fashionable Artwork (MAM) in Rio de Janeiro. Becoming a member of as government director in 1951, she labored alongside socialite Niomar Muniz Sodré. Whereas her counterpart dealt with fundraising and cultivated social cachet with a global jet-set, Portinho managed every day operations and oversaw development of the museum on reclaimed land adjoining to the Santos Dumont airport – preventing as soon as once more for the mission to be designed by Reidy.
The revolutionary construction, Brazil’s first brutalist monument, was formed completely from concrete, paving the best way for different acquainted landmarks in different Brazilian cities, such because the Museu de Arte de Sao Paulo (MASP), designed by one other cultured energy couple, Lina Bo Bardi and Pietro Maria Bardi. Accomplished a decade earlier than MASP, Reidy’s creation of democratic public house at MAM Rio unquestionably influenced Bo Bardi and plenty of others.
Below Portinho’s management, MAM Rio grew to become Brazil’s most necessary artwork house within the Nineteen Fifties and Nineteen Sixties, and he or she helped organise exhibitions that introduced Brazilian artwork to international consideration, primarily curating the nation’s cultural id on the world stage.
After leaving MAM Rio in 1966, Portinho continued together with her ardour for bringing artwork to everybody by introducing Brazilian up to date artwork to the curriculum as director of the Superior College of Industrial Design. All through her profession, she maintained that structure and design may very well be autos for social change, democratizing entry to magnificence and high quality.
Diplomatic genius in a male-dominated world
Portinho’s unquestionable success is all of the extra outstanding given the male-dominated setting during which she operated. Born in 1903 and raised in a politically progressive family, she was simply the third girl in Brazil to graduate as an engineer in 1925. In a office rife with machismo, her male colleagues challenged her to examine a lightning rod atop metropolis corridor – anticipating her to fail. Unknown to them, Portinho was an achieved mountaineer who accomplished the duty effortlessly, establishing a sample of exceeding expectations that might be repeated in a lifetime spent breaking by way of glass ceilings.
‘Carmen was very diplomatic,’ observes Guimaraens. ‘And to be diplomatic, not confrontational, was a method.’ This wasn’t passive lodging however calculated institutional change.
Whereas male contemporaries typically confronted methods head-on, Portinho understood that transformation required nuanced navigation of male-dominated areas from inside, argues Guimaraens. She famously labored side-by-side with Bertha Lutz, the sister of her first husband and the founding father of the Brazilian suffragette motion, to influence President Getulio Vargas to offer girls the vote in 1932.
Carmen Portinho takes workplace as director of Departamento de Habitação In style
(Picture credit score: Fotografia, sem autoria identificada, 16 fev. 1948. Arquivo Nacional)
A legacy that endures
Portinho’s legacy continues to resonate at the moment as cities worldwide grapple with housing crises and social inequality. Pedregulho’s integration of neighborhood amenities, artwork, and considerate city planning ideas stays as related now as when it was conceived. Not like many social housing initiatives that deteriorated into slums, the developments she championed maintained their high quality and neighborhood satisfaction over a long time.
‘Individuals are actually proud to stay in these locations as a result of there’s quite a lot of high quality,’ notes Guimaraens, highlighting Portinho’s enduring affect on how we take into consideration dignified housing for all residents.
Vila Kennedy, which obtained relocated residents from the favela in Praia do Pinto and different communities, a mission spearheaded by Carmen Portinho
(Picture credit score: Fotografia, sem autoria identificada, 1965. Arquivo Geral da Cidade do Rio de Janeiro)
In an period of accelerating housing precarity and social division, Carmen Portinho’s imaginative and prescient provides a robust counterpoint. The curved silhouettes and built-in communities in her initiatives stay not simply architectural landmarks, however bodily manifestations of the assumption that essentially the most deprived residents deserve the richest environments. By diplomatic genius and unwavering dedication to high quality, she rewrote Brazil’s cultural narrative whereas proving that true revolution occurs by way of persistent, strategic reimagination of what is attainable.
‘Carmen Portinho: Modernity in Building’ runs till March 2026 at MAM Rio, Brazil
Supply: Wallpaper
