Lina Bo Bardi Poetry

Courtesy of the Instituto Lina Bo e P. M. Bardi, São Paulo

Lina Bo Bardi was an important architect of her generation. The Museum of Art in Sao Paulo designed by Bo Bardi in 1968, is a really inspiring construction.
‘In 1957 I started the Museum of Sao Paulo project, looking for a simple architecture, able to communicate what used to be called monumentality, within the collective sense of Civil Dignity. Through the experience of the people I arrived to what could be called Poor Architecture, opting for direct solutions. The building spans seventy meters, with a five-meter cantiveler on either side. It is supported on four pillars tied with two reinforced concrete box beams at roof level...’

This audacious design proposes three parts, one large floating volume on concrete columns, a second half-buried volume and thirdly an enormous void used for multi-use public space. The public area is an open place like a belvedere to meet, to show exhibitions, festivals or circuses. Inside she created a manner of display with floating glass standing in concrete. At the moment the Henry Moore Institute Leeds offers an exhibition to explore the vision of Lina Bo Bardi, through the discovery of her sponteanous drawings that reflect the process of a unique, humanised conception.

Lina Bo Bardi (1914-1992) graduated as an architect at the University of Rome. She worked with Gio POnti in Milan and was director of Domus during the second war world. In 1943 she lost her office in bombardements. In 1946, Lina arived in Rio de Janeiro by boat and settled there because she felt the country like a place where everything was possible with the intelligent simplicity of the people. She became a Brazilian citizen in 1951. All her life she was dedicated to reseach and creation through jewellery, industrial design, installations, stage designs and architectural projects.