[1] One may say that Oscar Niemeyer had a perspective
on life completely different to that of many of those working
elsewhere in modern architecture. He began life as a modernist,
[4] but gradually forged an architectural style that was both unique
and ahead of its time, a symbol of the colour and lust for life of
his native Brazil. He once told a newspaper: ‘Mine is an
[7] architecture of curves; the body of a woman, the sinuous rivers,
the waves of the sea’.
Through his professional life, Niemeyer retained
[10] defining traits of the Modernists. However, the Brazilian
simply didn’t have the mass-production mindset natural to the
European modernists, obsessed with finding ways of building
[13] cheap housing for the multitudes. Niemeyer would ask ‘How
can you repeat a house that has specific level curves, a certain
light or a landscape? How can you build it over again?’ He
[16] explained later: ‘It was not the imposition of the right angle
which made me mad, but the obsessive concern of an
architectonical purity, of structural logic, of the systematic
[19] campaign against the free and creative shape.’
Gaynor Aaltonen. The history of architecture: iconic buildings throughout the ages. London: Arcturus, 2008, p. 615-621 (adapted)
Based on the text, judge the item.
Niemeyer’s style was surprising and unique from the very beginning of his career.
