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The Instituto de Arte Contempranea: The First Brazilian Design School, 1951–53

Autor: Leon, Ethel

Temas: Applied sciences -- Engineering -- Industrial engineering ; Arts -- Art history -- Art genres and
movements ; Arts -- Applied arts -- Design ; Arts -- Applied arts -- Design ; Behavioral sciences --
Anthropology -- Ethnology ; Behavioral sciences -- Anthropology -- Applied anthropology ; Arts -- Arts
participation -- Art education ; Arts -- Art history -- Art genres and movements ; Arts -- Art history -- Art
genres and movements ; Biological sciences -- Ecology -- Population ecology
En: Design Issues, 1 April 2011, Vol.27(2), pp.111-124
Descripción: Traces the brief history of the Instituto de Arte Contempranea (IAC) in Sao Paulo. The
Museu de Arte de Sao Paulo (MASP) had been founded in 1947 with Italian architect Pietro Maria Bardi
as director; Bardi was an advocate of modernism, and after arranging exhibitions to modernise public taste
in Brazil, he decided to start an industrial design school. At the same time, he and his wife, architect Lina
Bo Bardi, founded the magazine Habitat to promote industrial design for the machine age. Bardi contacted
art and design institutions in the USA asking for their prospectuses, using ideas from the Chicago Institute
of Design among others; he also consistently emphasised the influence of the Bauhaus on the school.
Students were generously supported with scholarship programs and free educational materials, but lack of
financial support from the municipal government and business firms in Brazil led to the school's closure in
1953. Reasons for the closure include the lack of interest by Brazilian industrialists in using the talents of
local designers, preferring to pay royalties for external designs. Graduates of the IAC went on to excel in
graphic design, interior design and landscaping, but none went into product design.
Idioma: Inglés
Identificador: ISSN: 07479360 ; E-ISSN: 15314790

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