Luis Barragan: The Quiet Revolution

Luis Barragán (Guadalajara 1902-Mexico City 1988), one of Mexico's leading architects, is now accepted as a great master of the Modern Movement. The poetic images of his houses and gardens, of the walls and fountains so characteristic of his work have all become icons of modern Mexican architecture. His masterpieces are famous for their innovative use of colour and for their reduced and abstract formal language. They harmoniously combine the modern and the traditional, nature and architecture giving results which, although closely linked to the context in which they were born, also assume international relevance. For the first time since Luis Barragán passed away, the wealth of drawings, documents and original photographs in his archives--now conserved at the Barragan Foundation in Switzerland--has been made available to a group of scholars of international standing and studied systematically. The essays collected in this volume are the result of intense scrutiny of the Barragán Archives and the many public and private collections in Mexico, Europe and the USA. Accompanid by outstanding visual representations, they present a fresh evaluation of Barragán's personality and his work--which managed to quietly interpret the revolutionary aspects of Modern architecture.