Full biography oscar niemeyer
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At its head, anchoring the Plaza of the Three Powers, the National Congress complex strikingly articulates its functions. In the biomorphic shapes of his most original designs, the architect reveals his engagement with the beauty of Brazil’s landscape and the human form. This composition anticipated his design with Lúcio Costa for the Brazilian Pavilion at the 1939 New York World’s Fair.
He was raised primarily by his grandmother and later attended a college for affluent youth. Another prominent design of his was the Penang State Mosque in George Town the state capital of Penang, Malaysia in the 1970s.
While in Paris, Niemeyer began designing furniture which was produced by Mobilier International. Much like his architecture, Niemeyer's furniture designs were meant to evoke the beauty of Brazil, with curves mimicking the female form and the hills of Rio de Janeiro.
Later years
Niemeyer, became one of the world's oldest practicing architects of international stature, outliving his modernist contemporaries, passing away at the age of 104 in 2012.
The international architectural periodicals of the 1940s and 1950s dedicated hundreds of dithyrambic pages to the 'chosen land of the most original and most audacious contemporary architecture', followed by monographs on individual architects like Niemeyer and Affonso Eduardo Reidy.
The 1940s and 1950s
In 1947, at 40, his worldwide recognition was confirmed when Niemeyer traveled to the United States to be part of the international team working on the design for the headquarters of the United Nations in New York.
In Funchal on Madeira, a 19th-century hotel was removed to build a casino by Niemeyer. Niemeyer emerged as a leader in this movement, designing numerous hotels, restaurants, schools, and entertainment facilities. Fitzroy Dearborn., 2005.
Selected Publications
Coma se faz, arquitetuna, Petropolis: Voxes.1986
Me sosia e eu, Rio de Janciro: Editoria Revan, 1992
Minha experiencia em Brasilia, Rio de Janeiro: Vitoria, 1961
Muu de Arte Contemporanea de Niterit, Rio de Janeiro: Editoria Revan.
Despite completing construction, the start of the civil war in Lebanon prevented it from achieving its full utility.He opened an office on the Champs-Elysees, and had customers in diverse countries, especially in Algeria where he designed the University of Science and Technology-Houari Boumediene. In 1965, two hundred professors, Niemeyer among them, asked for their resignation from the University of Brasilia, in protest against the government treatment of universities.
Evolving from a hybrid of schemes by Le Corbusier and Niemeyer, the Headquarters design recalls the Ministry of Education while anticipating Niemeyer’s work of the 1950s and 1960s.
In helping Kubitschek realize his dream of a modern centralized capital, Niemeyer directed a vast, politically sensitive project. Later, in 1978, this chair and other designs including the "Rio" chaise-lounge were produced in Brazil by the Japanese company Tendo, then Tendo Brasileira.
Yet, in mature works such as his Metropolitan Cathedral for Brasília (1958-60), Niemeyer achieves a more delicate personal statement. Beyond his architectural pursuits, he expressed his political beliefs by supporting the Soviet Union and joining the Communist Party.
Iconic Projects: Brasília
Despite facing setbacks in the 1950s, Niemeyer became the driving force behind the construction of Brasília, Brazil's new capital.
As a draftsman in Costa’s office, Niemeyer participated on a team headed by Costa that designed the headquarters of the Ministry of Education and Public Health in Rio (1936–43). His Obra do Berço (1937), a philanthropic daycare and maternity center in Rio displayed his adaptation of Le Corbusian forms to local climatic conditions. Niemeyer was a boy at the time of the Russian Revolution of 1917, and by the Second World War he became a young idealist.
He was born in the city of Rio de Janeiro in 1907 in the Laranjeiras neighborhood, on a street that later would receive the name of his grandfather. Also in 1966, at 59, he travelled to the city of Tripoli, Lebanon to design the International Permanent Exhibition Centre. He designed the government buildings and infrastructure, incorporating modern aesthetics and the innovative use of concrete.
Global Impact
Like Le Corbusier, Niemeyer recognized the potential of reinforced concrete in building structures.
Approached via a subterranean ramp through a low entrance, the space of the sanctuary opens dramatically overhead, with light filtering through blue, green, and frosted white glass, creating a nearly submarine effect, and evoking a state of reverence.
Insisting “architecture is not important, life is important,” Niemeyer reiterates his commitment to socially responsible design through works celebrating political or cultural allegiances, such as the Communist Party Headquarters (Paris, 1967-80) and the Memorial da América Latina (São Paulo, 1989).
In 1939, Niemeyer assumed the leadership of the team of architects (Lucio Costa, Carlos Leao, Affonso Eduardo Reidy, Jorge Moreira, Ernani Vasconcellos and Niemeyer, with Le Corbusier acting as a consultant) responsible for the Ministry that had assumed the task of shaping the 'novo homem, Brasileiro e moderno' (new man, Brazilian and modern).Following Niemeyer's request, the headquarters were renamed Palacio Gustavo Capanema in 1985.