The Congresso Internacional Extraordinário de Críticos de Arte took place in Brasília, São Paulo, and Rio de Janeiro from September 17 through 25, 1959. The theme of the event, which was proposed by the critic Mário Pedrosa, was “A cidade nova, síntese das artes.” Lectures given by critics and architects from various parts of the world stimulated debates and controversial discussions on Brazilian art and architecture. The program for the 7th Session of the event (entitled “Educação artística”) included lectures by the critics Herbert Read and A. Sartoris, the architect and urban planner Lúcio Costa, and the Brazilians Theon Spanudis and Fayga Ostrower. The Argentine industrial designer and theorist Tomás Maldonado (b. 1922)—who founded the Arte Concreto–Invención group in the 1940s in the Río de la Plata region and, at the time of this Congresso, was the director of the Hochschule für Gestaltung [Ulm School of Design]—envisioned a city based on new articulations prompted by mass communications, thus underscoring the need for a greater emphasis on the pedagogical aspect of art in the industrial area.
The polymath Mário Pedrosa (1900–81) was a politician, art critic, journalist, and professor, and was unquestionably one of the most influential scholars of the historiography of Brazilian art. He was the director of the MAM-SP (Museu de Arte Moderna de São Paulo) from 1961 to 1963. He was a founding member of the Associação Brasileira de Críticos de Arte (affiliated to the AICA), and was a key player in the organization of the Bienal Internacional de São Paulo during its first twenty years (1951?63).
The Congresso de Brasília (1959) included a presentation by the North American professor and art critic Meyer Shapiro on taking an interdisciplinary approach to the study of art. Shapiro’s lecture was entitled “A pintura e a escultura no coletivo urbanístico e arquitetônico” [doc. no. 1110403].
