Special Brut

Chu Ming Silveira’s most famous creation was the orelhão, an ear-shaped public-telephone pod she designed in 1966 while working for the Brazilian Telephone Company. An orelhão prototype stands outside the exposed-concrete house the architect and designer built for her family in the Morumbi suburb of São Paulo, a piece of functional sculpture reflected in the swimming pool.

The house itself is often overlooked in the mythology around Silveira, a refugee from Shanghai who launched her architecture career shortly after settling in São Paulo. This is a shame, because its groovy brand of Paulista Brutalism – a midcentury style that juxtaposes thick, raw concrete against tropical greenery – is an experience. It is also increasingly rare. With São Paulo in the midst of a property boom and many families opting for the security of gated communities, street-facing homes in desirable Morumbi are starting to disappear. ‘The temptation to buy properties and take down the house is huge,’ says Filipe Assis, founder of the travelling-exhibition platform Aberto. ‘If they’re not listed, there’s a risk they’ll be lost.’

Fortunately, the art market is experiencing its own boom in this culturally savvy metropolis. A few years back, while Assis was studying at Sotheby’s in London and fantasising about venues for his first art showcase back home, a friend suggested using a private residence. That friend just happened to work with the Oscar Niemeyer Foundation and the residence was Casa Niemeyer, the ‘concrete poet’s’ only domestic project. Assis realised that the overlap of art and design could elevate the stories he wanted to tell. At the same time, it could raise awareness of architectural treasures hiding in plain sight. ‘Perhaps,’ he says, ‘the public would start reevaluating these houses as a history of architecture in Brazil, and the city, of course.’

In 2022 Assis launched the first edition of Aberto in Casa Niemeyer. On 10 August, he’ll stage Aberto’s third instalment chez Silveira.

Silveira’s half walls, low ceilings and unusual angles inspired Assis and his curators to fill the home with Brazilian ‘masters’: trippy abstracts by postwar artists such as Lygia Pape, Lygia Clark and pop-feminist Wanda Pimentel. ‘We tried to privilege women, and women who had been under the radar for years,’ says Assis. They also gained access to the studio and oeuvre of Anna Maria Maiolino, a Golden Lion recipient at the 2024 Venice Biennale.

Aberto 03 has many more women on show besides. Around the same time Assis was falling for the ‘very specific’ Brutalism of Silveira’s home, he discovered architect Ruy Ohtake’s concrete villa for his mother, the late modern artist Tomie Ohtake. The architect’s penchant for wavy lines, cut-outs and blocks of primary colour cleverly echoed his mother’s dynamic public art, and provided the perfect counterpoint to the Silveira home. ‘Having two houses, just this year, felt right,’ he says. ‘I couldn’t imagine separating them now.’ Assis built it into the programme.

Constructed on either side of 1970, the two homes share a common materiality, yet Ohtake’s is defined by curves and colour, an extension of the artist’s ribbon-like sculptures in red, yellow, blue and green. For the Aberto residency, the curators have sought established artists who were tied to Ohtake during her long career for new, unseen contributions. ‘Because Ohtake lived to 101 and produced to the very end, she was well connected with the artists here in São Paulo,’ says Assis. ‘We felt it was right to honour contemporary art from artists she knew.’ To that end, a painting by Luiz Zerbini, a longtime friend, will take its place by a Laercio Redondo mobile and a Super 8 film by Luiz Roque.

Placing so many creative women in conversation with one another was not easy. Placing two architects together proved impossible. In Ohtake’s son Ruy, Assis found the next best thing. And though he had no specific mandate to address this gender gap, or the politics surrounding it, he wanted to correct the balance. ‘I do think we have quite a legacy.’

‘Aberto 03’, 11 August – 9 September 2024, at the residences of Chu Ming Silveira and Tomie Ohtake, São Paulo. For more about the exhibition, visit www.aberto.art

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