Thomas Fryer

Yale School of Architecture

George Nelson Scholarship Proposal

18 January 2011

Rogelio Salmona and The Trajectory of Urban-Social Intervention in Colombia

Contents

1 Proposal

2 Itinerary and Budget

3 Resume

Attachment 1 Portfolio

Attachment 2 Writing Samples:

1 Late Inversions:

Le Corbusier and La Tourette

2 Control and Character:

Claude-Nicholas Ledoux and

the salt-works at Arc-et-Senans

3 Reorientation:

SANAA and the New Museum

To practice architecture in Latin

America is a political act: to defend

the public realm, to architecturally

intervene in the city, to protect the

landscape, to consider aesthtics

as an ethic, to fight against social

segregation, all these factors have

been the motivators to practice this

job that, as Le Corbusier said,

“is a face of the spirit”.1

Rogelio Salmona

Above -

Fundación Cristiana

de la Vivienda (1961)

San Cristóbal

Cover Image -

Residencial Torres del Parque (1970)

Bogotá

. . .going well beyond the fan-like,

high-rise paradigm pioneered by

Hans Scharoun . . .the Residencias El

Pargue stacked up into a sculptural

form that displayed a plastic affinity

not only for the grain of the city but

also for the profile and sweep of the

nearby mountains.4

Kenneth Frampton

Above -

Residencial Torres del Parque (1970)

Bogotá

Below -

Neuva Santa Fe

Residential Complex (1987)

Growth, Decline and Rebirth in Bogotá

The rapid growth and urbanization of Bogotá in the early 20th Century attracted the

attention of numerous architects, including Le Corbusier and Jose Louis Sert, who would

both develop “pilot” plans for the capital. While the limitations of the existing Beaux-Arts

city offered an ideal testing ground for modernist principles to be implemented, both

architects failed to correctly identify the key geographic and social specific to Colombia.

The cities instead “developed alone and without any control”

2

, particularly after 1945,

when a turn towards conservatism stripped any liberalizing agenda from the urban policy.

Explosive population growth as a result of political terror in rural areas doubled the

1951 population to 1, 700, 000 in 1967, and was followed by the emergence of organized

crime in the 1970’s. Civil strife and active Marxist guerilla groups were evident in Bogotá

into the 1980’s. Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, programs to arrest

urban decline through civic projects, including architecture and urban design, were

implemented.

At the millennium, rates of violence in Bogotá had been effectively tackled. Literacy,

education and poverty alleviation programs were physically manifest in new public

libraries, schools and sporting facilities. The successful push for car free zones and

an expanding bicycle network renewed debate about public space. At the 2006 Venice

Biennale Bogotá won the Golden Lion award for cities. Bogotá is again a destination for

travellers, and a reputation for narcoviolence is steadily giving way to one of an urbane

and progressive city.

To what degree can we attribute the post-millennial rebirth of Bogotá with the

architectural and urban-social interventions of the preceding thirty years?

Building beyond Europe

Rogelio Salmona (1927-2007) was a French-born Colombian who returned to Europe at

19 for his university education. In France he worked with Le Corbusier, on the city of

Chandigarh and the Maison Jaoul. Returning to Bogotá in 1957, Salmona exhibited a desire

to confront social issues in his work from as early as 1961, in his Fundación Cristiana de la

Vivienda, San Cristóbal. His architectural insertions to Bogotá envisioned a cosmopolitan

yet intimate city; the thresholds of private and public spaces were designed to maximize

social encounters and interaction with the landscape. Salmona projected existing

topographies upward to become roofscapes and circulation, as evident in his Residencial

Torres del Parque (1970). His engagement with “everyday making”

3

and extensive use

of Bogotá brick reinforced a commitment to using local, climatically intelligent and

economical materials.

Salmona’s ambitions and methodology - an architcetonic inventiveness and organic

formal exploration - ensure that today, surrounded by recent development, his projects

remain landmark buildings in central Bogotá.

Evolutionary Urbanism

A critically neglected aspect of Salmona’s work is his shaping of the public spaces of

the city. While his buildings are cited for their formal and spatial qualities, the carefully

callibrated public spaces, landscapes and public-private transitional zones of his large-

scale projects have been little studied. Salmona’s urban legacy lies in his public works,

where he intelligently negotiated the requirements of private residency, ownership and

the burgeoning access to cultural resources that Colombia experienced, via the provision

of surprising and inclusive urban spaces. A comprehensive study of Salmona’s urban

agenda, as well as the responses to his interventions, is overdue.

Salmona’s Neuva Santa Fe Residential Complex proposed a carefully choreographed public/

private interaction, carved out of a dense urban scheme. Blocks were lined with perimeter

developments that retained a green, landscaped interior. A diagonal cut incised through four

blocks, unifying several key locations and articulating a green connective thread that engaged

sports fields, park and community center, and effectively opened the complex to the greater city.

The late Salmona, in works such as the Virgilio Barco Public Library, charted a new urban

identity. Environmental elements come to the fore, in a structure partially absorbed by

the landscape and defined by an intricate water management network evident in a careful

interplay of pools, channels, and drains and framed by the geometry of the libarary. Here,

Salmona’s integration of building and landscape elements was “closest to fulfilling the

ambitious, socio-cultural program that was a constant, if largely latent, theme throughout

his entire career”

5

.

Proposal

Today global opportunities for architecture to support state-funded economic, social and

environmental initiatives grow in the emerging economies of Asia, Latin America and

the Middle East. It is instructive for architectural researchers to observe the genesis of

the tactical and formal strategies that have been effective harbingers of development in

rapidly urbanized centers like Bogotá.

Acknowledging the role that Rogelio Salmona’s architecture and urban works had in the

renaissance of the Colombian capital, what lessons can we take from him? I propose a

course of research devoted to Salmona’s public buildings and their urbanism. Beginning

by identifying his seminal urban incursions, photographic documentation, followed by a

diagrammatic urban analysis of their role in contemporary Bogotá, then combining the

two in a short run publication that underpins the exhibition at the school of architecture.

As a postscript to the study of Salmona, I propose a short survey of contemporary

urbanism in Medellin, where an extraordinary burgeoning of architecture is currently

delivering public facilities as urban strategy in a manner reminiscent of Salmona’s most

successful interventions in Bogotá.

Academic Context

My interest in Latin American architecture and urbanism is a desire to identify the

fundamentals of the discipline. I am intrigued by the avenues through which outside

theories, practices and forms are recontextualized when imported. Uruguayan architect

Eladio Dieste was critical to the research and development of my Spring ‘10 Replication

studio project and sparked preliminary research into contemporary South American

architcetural trajectories. I also enjoyed the compilation of several small publications in

Books and Architecture (Fall ‘10) and am eager to employ the short run publication as a

strategic and valuable medium for the dissemination of research.

This semester, I am enrolled in Joel Sanders’ Human/Nature seminar - where we will be

examining the convergences of architecture, landscape and urban design in contemporary

projects - and Inner Worlds, with Brennan Buck, which focuses on materials and form in the

service of architectural phenomenology. I look forward to delving into these varied topics

with an eye toward Salmona, urbanism and public space, and the successes of Bogotá.

Below -

Virgilio Barco Public Library (2001)

Bibliography

Arcila, Claudia Antonia, Tríptico rojo : conversaciones con Rogelio Salmona /Claudia

Antonia Arcila, Bogotá, Colombia : Taurus, c2007.

Aschner Rosselli, Juan Pablo, Contrapunto y confluencia en el concierto arquitectónico :

Biblioteca Virgilio Barco, 1. ed, Bogotá : Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Sede Bogotá,

Facultad de Artes, 2008.

Castro, Ricardo L, Rogelio Salmona / Ricardo L. Castro ; dirección, diseño y edición,

Benjamín Villegas ; textos complementarios, Rogelio Salmona ; prólogo, Germán Téllez.

Salmona, 1. ed, Bogotá, Columbia : Villegas Editores, 1998.

Hernández, Felipe, Millington, Mark and Borden, Iain (eds), Transculturation : cities,

spaces and architectures in Latin America, Amsterdam ; New York : Rodopi, 2005.

Hofer, Andreas, Karl Brunner y el Urbanismo Europeo en América Latina / prólogo de

Rogelio Salmona, 1. ed, Bogotá : Ancora : Corporación la Candelaria, 2003.

Yoshida Nobayuki ed. , Architecture +Urbanism 450, Rogelio Salmona, Japan Architect /

A+U, Tokyo, March 2008.

1 Architecture +Urbanism, p92

2 Architecture +Urbanism, p132

3 Transculturation, 138

4 Architecture +Urbanism, p28

Itinerary & Budget

Time Period Location & Itinerary

May 11 -June 11 Rome / ITALY

1291c Continuity & Change. (Pending Acceptance)

June 15 Rome to New York

June 16 New York to Bogota

WEEK 1: Bogota / COLOMBIA

June 20 - 27 Visit - Fundacion Rogelio Salmona*

Avenida Jiménez de Quesada (1998 - 2000)

Complejo Residencial Torres del Parque (1963 - 1970)

Nueva Santa Fe (1985 - 1998)

Archivo General de Nacion (1988 - 1992)

WEEK 2: Bogota / COLOMBIA

June 27 - July 4 Fundación Cristiana de la Vivienda San Cristóbal (1963 - 1971)

Museo de Arte Moderno de Bogota (1971 - 1979)

Alto de Pinos (1975 - 1981)

WEEK 3: Bogota Area / COLOMBIA

July 4 - July 11 Museo Quimbaya, Quimbaya (1983 - 1986)

Casas de la Sabana, Tabio (1976 - 1992)

Biblioteca Virgilio Barco (1998 - 2001)

WEEK 4: Cali / COLOMBIA

July 11 - July 18 Fundacion para la Educacion Superior, FES (1987 - 1990)

WEEK 5: Medellin / COLOMBIA

July 18 - July 25 Biblioteca Espana - Giancarlo Mazzanti (2005)

Medellín Botanical Garden - Plan B Arquitectos (2006)

4 Sports Coliseums for The IX South American

Sports Games - Plan B Arquitectos (2010)

WEEK 6: Medellin / COLOMBIA

July 25 - August 1 Swimming Pools for The IX South American

Sports Games - Paisajes Emergentes (2008)

San Javier Library Park - Javier vera Arquitectos (2008)

Parque Explora - Alejandro Echeverri (2009)

WEEK 7: Cartagena de Indias + Villa de Leyva / COLOMBIA

August 4 - August 11 Casa del Fuerte de San Juan de Manzanillo (1978 - 1981)

UNESCO Site - Cartagena Walled City and Fortress*

National Monument - Villa de Leyva*

WEEK 8: Bogota / COLOMBIA

August 11 - August 18 Various Buildings by Fernando Martínez Sanabria (1925-1991)

Contemporary of Salmona’s*

Bogota Ciclovia (Car-free Day / Cycleway) Network

August 20 Bogota to New York

* All itinerary destinations are designed by Rogelio Salmona

unless marked with an asterisk.

Budget:

Travel Expenses (Room/Board,

Local Transit,

Incidental Expenses)

100

600 (Air)

840

840

840

80 (Bus)

80 (Bus)

250 (Air)

200 (Air) 840

840

60 (Bus) 840

80 (Bus)

200 (Air) 840

1550 6820

150 Salmona Monographs

500 Insurance

1500 Digital Camera

200 Portable Data Storage

2000 Printing & Binding

1000 Contingency

13720 TOTAL