Continuity, pause and move in the urban fabric: the City of Music in Barra da Tijuca - Rio de Janeiro

Abstract

Yesterday homogeneous, today hybrid, plural, cities structure our perception of the world. The energy transmitted by matter, the result of action and reaction between forms structures the city and its places of living together. Just as all construction intervenes in the landscape, every city must also be legible, have reference points, not to become a chaos. Put in order an environment becomes a vast plot of references. In his pilot plan, Lúcio Costa predicted to Barra da Tijuca an occupation of land consisting of buildings and public gardens that would be great spaces of sociality. But, unlikeBrasilia, where the land belonged to the state, the predictions of Lúcio Costa will be changed. Condominiums, offices, privatized gardens and malls will come to settle in recent decades. Today, the City of Music, designed by Christian de Portzamparc, has been installed on the Avenida das Américas, surpassing its status of a simple architectural project and giving people the opportunity to re-take ownership of a piece of the city visible in the distance and “significant”.