The importance of Gregori Warchavchik according to the CASACOR cast

In Vila Mariana, in São Paulo (SP), is the Casa da Rua Santa Cruz, the first modern building in Brazil, from 1928. It was the home of Gregori Warchavchik and Mina Klabin, his wife. Amid the final preparations of CASACOR São Paulo , which premieres on May 28, three professionals from the cast shared their reflections on the importance of the modernist legacy of Gregori Warchavchik (1896-1972). The work of the Russian architect who became a naturalized Brazilian is currently being revisited in an exhibition in São Paulo , but his ideas are not stuck in the past. The rupture that his design represented at the beginning of the 20th century has not yet been fully assimilated and continues to have a potential revolutionary in architecture, in the view of the professionals we spoke to.

Otto Felix: rupture still ongoing

“The rupture in the 1920s was so important that to this day it has not been possible to break the connection with the classic, which no longer made sense at that time and which they still try to reproduce today. Only after a long time and with great names of current modernism - such as Marcio Kogan and Isay Weinfeld - that's when we started to see a popularization of the contemporary, straight and unadorned houses, which they called fake houses”, says Otto Felix, who designed Casa das Sibipirunas at CASACOR São Paulo 2019. The discourse and attitude of rupture materialized by Warchavchik bear the influence of the French-Swiss architect Le Corbusier, whom he knew and of whom he was ambassador at a congress in Brazil. It was Le Corbusier who proposed, around 1926, the well-known five points of modern architecture:

• Pilotis
• Free facade
• Ribbon windows
• Garden terrace
• Open plan

“Warchavchik was attentive, wrote a manifesto and built the first modernist house in Brazil. This gave weight to the movement in the country”, says Otto. “It is worth remembering that the second modernist house in Brazil is by Flávio de Carvalho and it is coming soon then, in 1933, in Valinhos (SP). I participated in its restoration”, highlights Otto. In an excerpt from the manifesto, Warchavchik states: “The architect, educated in the spirit of classical traditions, not understanding that the building is a constructive organism whose façade is its face, preaches a false façade, an imitation of some old style, and often arrives to sacrifice our comforts for an illusory beauty (…) Down with absurd decorations and long live logical construction, this is the motto that must be adopted by the modern architect”.

Marília Pellegrini: the concept of the living machine

“When Warchavchik arrived here, the references that Brazilians had for architecture were still French, from the Art Nouveau movement, from the Belle Époque. He simply denied all of that,” emphasizes the professional, who is developing the Cosentino Container House at the São Paulo exhibition. The efficient lines of the machines of the Industrial Revolution, which indicated to Warchavchik and other architects the hope of a better world, were a reference for the clean lines of modernism.

“Within the same rationalism and functionalism, he also translated the desire of an era into furniture with simple lines, using Brazilian wood and still very current today. I myself use Warchavchik's tables a lot in my work. It's almost 100 years since his arrival. in Brazil and what he did is still done today. He was visionary and essential for the transformation of Brazilian architecture in the modern era”, concludes Marília. In this project, Marília Pellegrini uses two Warchavchik tables, one on each side of the sofa.

Leo Romano: Intelligence in Warchavchik's Strategy

For Leo Romano, who is responsible for the Paredes Mágica project, an important point was Warchavchik's astuteness in anticipating possible criticism of his work. “In the modernist house, facing impositions from the City Hall, he presented the project with a classic design - but already thinking about the forms of the construction without the ornaments. In the end, he finishes the house without the ornaments and claims lack of money. Which did not happen , because he married a rich woman and lived among very wealthy people. This was brilliant. He broke with an aesthetic when it was almost a violation and contributed definitively to the implementation of our Brazilian modernist architecture”, says Leo Romano. “I find the elegance and simplicity of the lines, the purity of the monoblocks and volumes that he created very beautiful. I find the expressiveness of the volumes that he creates very beautiful. Warchavchik is unfortunately a name that is little remembered these days. He deserves more visibility and recognition”, points out Leo Romano.