In this article I argue that the modernist aesthetic program in post-war Rio de Janeiro, geared towards national construction, competed with a new aesthetic project founded on the universalism of concrete forms. Rather than reflecting the influence of foreign or national avant-garde movements, this change arose from the impact a series of social relations and practices that imposed the recognition of new artistic values. To examine this phenomenon, I reconstruct the history of the Engenho de Dentro Studio, the locus of a sui generis sociability that united young artists, an art critic and artists interned in the Pedro II National Psychiatric Centre.
Concrete Art; Virgin Art; Engenho de Dentro Studio; Abraham Palatnik; Almir Mavignier; Ivan Serpa; Mario Pedrosa