Brasilia

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Brasilia: A Modernist Marvel in the Heart of Brazil

Brasilia, officially known as the Federal District, serves as the capital city of Brazil and a significant landmark in the realm of urban planning. Established in 1960, Brasilia replaced Rio de Janeiro as the national capital, marking a new era for Brazil's political and cultural landscape. This metropolis, located in the Brazilian highlands in the country's Central-West region, boasts a unique blend of modern architecture, innovative city planning, and rich cultural heritage.

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UNESCO Description of the World Heritage Site

Brasilia, a capital created ex nihilo in the centre of the country in 1956, was a landmark in the history of town planning. Urban planner Lucio Costa and architect Oscar Niemeyer intended that every element – from the layout of the residential and administrative districts (often compared to the shape of a bird in flight) to the symmetry of the buildings themselves – should be in harmony with the city’s overall design. The official buildings, in particular, are innovative and imaginative.

UNESCO Justification of the World Heritage Site

Criterion (i): Brasilia is a singular artistic achievement, a prime creation of the human genius, representing, on an urban scale, the living expression of the principles and ideals advanced by the Modernist Movement and effectively embodied in the Tropics through the urban and architectural planning of Lucio Costa and Oscar Niemeyer. The Brazilian experience is notable for the grandiosity of the project, one which not only brought to a definitive close a particular historical epoch, but which was closely tied to an ambitious development strategy and to a process of national self-affirmation before the world.

Criterion (iv): Brasilia is a unique example of urban planning brought to fruition in the 20th century, an expression of the urban principles of the Modernist Movement as set out in the 1943 Athens Charter, in Le Corbusier’s 1946 treatise How to Conceive Urbanism, and in the architectural designs of Oscar Niemeyer, including the buildings of the three powers (Presidential Palace, Supreme Court and Congress with its twin highrise buildings flanked by the cupola of the Senate building and by the inverted one of the House of Representatives), and the Cathedral with its 16 parabaloids 40 metres in height, the Pantheon of Juscelino Kubitschek and the National Theatre.

Encyclopedia Record: Brasília

Brasília is the capital city of Brazil and the Federal District. Located in the Brazilian highlands in the country's Central-West region, it was founded by President Juscelino Kubitschek on 21 April 1960, to replace Rio de Janeiro as the national capital. Brasília is Brazil's third-most populous city after São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, with a population of 2.8 million. Among major Latin American cities, it has the highest GDP per capita.

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