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Flávio de Carvalho: Fazenda Capuava
Archive of Lisette Lagnado
1980s
I went to see Flávio de Carvalho’s Fazenda Capuava for the first time in the late 1980s with artist friends. The building’s decay was already advanced at this point. These photographs were given to me due to my interest in potentially creating an archive about the artist.
Flávio built the Fazenda in Valinhos, which is near Campinas, just about 90 kilometers outside of São Paulo in the countryside. With its central structure reminiscent of Egyptian architecture and swimming pool, the complex has a mythical appearance. It’s an authentic example of modernist construction and the only project that he managed to fully build according to his vision, with the exception of the Alameda Lorena apartment houses that he also designed but have been significantly altered over the years.
The house was very famous. Completed in 1938, the premises served as his home and studio, and also as a venue where he received guests from all around the world until his death in 1973. Flávio lived and worked by the idea of making one’s life less private and more openly free. With its mezzanine and terraces, the interior of the main hall evokes a theater stage.
In the big swimming pool in front of the house, swimming in the nude was matter of course. In and around the house Flávio introduced his friends and guests to his “laboratory” for erotic practices. In his utopian concept described in “The City of Naked Men,” an article published in 1930 and also a conference that he organized, he imagines his vision of the American city of the future, without God, taboos, or private property.
The raw concrete walls are a hallmark of Brazilian architecture, and there are parallels to this at the ExRotaprint space, where raw concrete is also a signature element of the building.
In addition to his artistic practice, Flávio left behind an expansive corpus of written texts on architecture, fashion, psychology, theater, and other fields. There is still much research to be done on his prolific life.
Until today it has not been possible to raise funds for the restoration of this designated heritage site and cultural monument.
Lisette Lagnado
Weaving Solidarity
Renata Cervetto and Duygu Örs
Q&A
THE MOBILIZATION
Nicolás Cuello
Text
Grupo Experimental de Cine en acción
Gabriel Peluffo
Drawing
Maternidades subversivas
María Llopis
Monograph
Género y colonialidad en busca de claves de lectura y de un vocabulario estratégico descolonial
Rita Segato
Essay
Umbilical Cord Amulet
McCord Museum
Object
