Arquitetura-objeto: a enunciação do modernismo em Adolf Loos e Le Corbusier a partir do objeto técnico

Abstract

This work examines the rise of modernism in European architecture in the first decades of the 20th century, focusing on the works of Adolf Loos and Le Corbusier. The socioeconomic context of rapid technological transformation and the advance of industrial capital confronted the field of architecture with the demand to redefine its aesthetic paradigms. Our analysis revolves around the issue of form, not only as the building envelope but as a system of socially constructed meanings. To investigate this issue, we draw on concepts from semiology and sociological views of technology, exploring the relationship between the alignment of architecture with modernity and the technical object. We argue that Adolf Loos and Le Corbusier emerged as key agents who, in response to the pressure to modernize architecture, articulated the theoretical cohesion that secured their historiographical notoriety. We analyze their most prominent works, Ornament and Crime and Towards a New Architecture, as rhetorical tools advocating for the adhesion to the socioeconomic structures perceived at their time as the advancement of modern life over humanity. This work proposes, therefore, a critical interpretation of the theoretical foundations of modernism as it emerged from Loos and Le Corbusier. We start from their proposal to rid architecture of buildings, then proceed with an analysis of modernist alignment with the mode of existence of industrialized objects, and finally evaluate its consequences for architecture. By outlining these relationships, we aim to contribute to a broader understanding of modernist architecture - a system of meanings rooted in the social and economic transformations at the turn of the 20th century.