Uma presença discreta: toldos e cortinas na fase purista de Le Corbusier

Abstract

The present text studies the role of fabrics as architectural devices during the so-called “purist” phase of the architect Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris, better known as Le Corbusier, in the 1920s and in some of the projects of the following decade. If rugs gained attention during this period, the same did not happen with other types of textiles. Absent in the texts, they appeared discreetly, in the corners of the images – photos, graphic pieces and sketches. Its tracking allows us to understand the modalities of tissue use: for internal spatial modulation; in the outdoor room, suggesting architectural formations (ceilings, walls, windows), and for solar control of the built envelope, in many things “paper architectures”, viable only in the drawings. The fabrics were exchanged for other devices to perform the same functions, more in line with the poetic expression of the architect. Discreet as they are, the fabrics planned or adopted in this period are subtle but unmistakable signs of his spatial experiments and the vicissitudes of his search for space, light and clarity.