Suspended above Guanabara Bay, Oscar Niemeyer’s MAC Niterói sets the stage for Then and Now – Brazilian Legacy, a landmark exhibition that brings two generations of Brazilian designers together. It’s presented by Galerie Philia and on view from 29th to 31st August.

The show presents a constellation of voices: iconic mid-century modernists who helped forge a national identity through design, and contemporary artists whose work reframes legacy through material experimentation.

Niemeyer said: ” “I deliberately disregarded the right angle and rationalist architecture designed with ruler and square to boldly enter the world of curves and straight lines offered by reinforced concrete.”

This legacy is rooted in a broader project: the construction of a modern Brazilian design language that responded not only to European modernist ideals, but to Brazil’s own materials, climates, and social realities. Pionniers of Brazilian modernist design are honoured, including Joaquim Tenreiro, Fernando Mendes and Jorge Zalszupin. The new generation of designers in dialogue include: Alexia Vela Akasaka, Gustavo Dias and Hanna Englund and many more.

More than sixty works will be staged in this exceptional exhibition, the largest of its kind to date in Brazil, and the first to bring together such a broad and inter-generational survey of both modernist and contemporary Brazilian designers.

Image: © Denilson Machado, Courtesy of Galerie Philia