Tendo como tema geral de pesquisa propostas e intervenções urbanas contemporâneas, o trabalho pretende discutir a natureza e distinções existentes entre os discursos, as propostas e ações, particularmente no campo cultural, formuladas e executadas na área da Estação da Luz da cidade de São Paulo pelos governos Marta Suplicy - 2001/2004 - e José Serra [e hoje seu substituto Gilberto Kassab], articuladas com as propostas do governo estadual, retrocedendo quando necessário ao entendimento das ações realizadas a partir das gestões de Luiza Erondina - 1989/1992 - no governo municipal e no primeiro governo de Mario Covas no Estado - 1995/1998 [e seu sucedâneo]. Desta forma, no contexto das mudanças econômicas ocorridas nos últimos 25/30 anos, que conheceram no plano urbano a noções de cidades globais, objetivou-se investigar criticamente o processo pelo qual a cultura e os equipamentos culturais têm adquirido um papel cada vez mais central nas práticas das chamadas políticas urbanas, valendo-se de ações que por vezes apresentam-se de forma antagônica, ao viés político dos governos, e por outro, não, em que pese o mesmo viés político. Isto salientou a necessidade de investigar as finalidades do Estado, nos seus vários níveis, e de seus parceiros preferenciais, nas intervenções dos espaços urbanos centrais da cidade contemporânea, num período em que estas ações surgem enquadradas por uma discussão internacional sobre o papel das cidades na economia contemporânea e o lugar do urbanismo e do planejamento urbano [estratégicos] nas políticas públicas. Enfim, a pesquisa teve como objeto de estudo as intervenções urbanas contemporâneas: o caso da área da Luz, no centro de São Paulo. A intenção foi, ao longo da pesquisa, pontuar os princípios que conduziram [até o momento] tais práticas, suas diretrizes e, principalmente, a forma com que o conjunto de relações sociais, econômicas, políticas e culturais transforma e modela os ambientes urbanos e o imaginário dos habitantes. Desta forma, o estudo das intervenções no centro histórico de São Paulo reconhece uma política de conjunto, mas parte da escolha e avaliação das ações propostas e efetivadas na área da Luz e antiga Cracolândia, um dos principais alvos do programa de requalificação urbana da prefeitura de São Paulo e, por isso, atualmente denominado Pólo Luz - Santa Ifigênia. Esta concentra uma série de questões presentes no que poderia ser definido como uma agenda de problemas e ações a ela associadas, mormente a revitalização das chamadas áreas degradadas, a partir da implementação de propostas e equipamentos culturais, que integram ou se espelham em modelos de políticas urbanas internacionais. Constituindo a pauta não só de arquitetos e urbanistas, mas também de várias outras áreas de conhecimento geografia, sociologia, economia, as discussões sobre a cidade requereram um razoável embasamento teórico, sendo a clareza dos conceitos envolvidos uma das metas estabelecidas a princípio. Motivou especialmente a percepção de que as noções de planejamento estratégico, competitividade entre as cidades, globalização e cidades globais saturaram o debate urbano contemporâneo e que a [s] ideologia [s] urbana [s] por interessa diversos acabava [m] por criar uma questionável impressão de coesão de conceitos que deveria ser posto à prova. Entre outros, George Simmel, Manfredo Tafuri, Fredic Jameson e Rem Koolhaas foram importantes aportes. / Having as a general subject of inquiry proposals and urban contemporary interventions, this dissertation intends to discuss and analyze the nature and existent distinctions between the speeches, the proposals and actions, particularly in the cultural field, formulated and executed in the area of Estação Luz in the city of São Paulo by the governments Marta Suplicy - 2001/2004 - and José Serra [and his current substitutive Gilberto Kassab], articulated with the proposals of the state government, retreating when necessarily to the understanding of the actions carried out from the managements of Luiza Erondina - 1989/1992 - in the municipal government and of the first government of Mario Covas in the state of São Paulo - 1995/1998 [and his substitutive]. In this way, in the context of the economical changes that took place in the last 25/30 years, that knew in the urban plan the notion of global cities, the goal was to investigate critically the process for which the culture and the cultural equipments have been acquiring a more and more central role in the practices of the socalled urban politics, using actions that for times show up in the antagonistic form, in function of the political slant of the governments, and for other, not, in what it weighs the same political slant. This pointed out the necessity to investigate the finality of the state, in its several levels, and of its main partners, in the interventions on the central urban spaces of the contemporary city, in a period in what these actions appear fitted by an international discussion about the role of the cities in the contemporary economy and the place of urbanism and of the [strategic] urban planning in the public politics. Finally, this inquiry has as objective of study the urban contemporary interventions: the case of the area of Luz in the centre of Sao Paulo. The intention along the inquiry was to punctuate the principles that conducted [until now] such practices, its directives and, mainly, the form with which the set of social, economical, political and cultural relations transforms and models the urban environments and the imaginary of its inhabitants. In this way, the study of the interventions in the historical centre of São Paulo recognizes a politics of set, but it breaks from the choice and evaluation of the actions proposed and brought into effect in the area of Luz and former Cracolândia, one of the main targets of the urban redesign programs of the city hall of São Paulo and, therefore, at present so-called Pólo Luz - Santa Efigênia. This area concentrates a series of present questions in what it might be defined as an agenda of problems and actions to them associated, chiefly the revitalization of the called degraded areas, from the implementation of proposals and cultural equipments, which they integrate or which mirror in models of international urban politics. Constituting the list not only of the architects and town planners, but also of several other areas of knowledge - geography, sociology, economy -, the discussions about the city demanded a reasonable theoretical foundation, being to clarity of the wrapped concepts one of the marks established on the beggining of this inquiry. It caused specially the perception of which the notions of strategic planning, competitiveness between the cities, globalization and global cities saturated the urban contemporary debate and that the urban[e] ideology[ies] marked by different interests ended for creating a questionable impression of cohesion of concepts that should be put to the test. Georg Simmel, Manfredo Tafuri, Fredric Jameson and Rem Koolhaas are important and essentials bases of this work.

Confronted with issues, whose (socioeconomic) causes cannot be resolved through the modification of the built environment, architectural interventions may often inadvertently aid the reproduction of the problems they seek to resolve. In eliminating symptoms of social inequality, alienation and marginalization, architecture can legitimize the social order out of which they arise. In such situations, architects’ attempts to concern themselves with narrowly practical concerns are insufficient even to their own aims, and in order to properly address the issues facing it, architecture must simultaneously operate as a vehicle for social critique and political emancipation. In the work of philosopher Slavoj Žižek, a critical-emancipatory intervention corresponds to an emphasis of a constitutive tension and discord (“the gap”) within what is commonly perceived as a stable, neutral background. Critique strives not to explicitly reveal existing problems. Instead, it reveals an inherent inconsistency within an implicit, ideological fantasy of order and harmony that allows us to naturalize these problems. Consequently, the critical-emancipatory potential of architecture resides not in its programmatic content nor in its representational image, but in its capacity to disrupt the reassuring affective texture of ideology. Critique resides in a formally subtle (concerning architecture in its narrowest definition as an affective structure), yet politically radical shift in how problems of everyday life are interpreted and processed; re-introducing a minimal sense of disquietude that is both critical and emancipatory. The disquietude, that marks an absence of a fantasy of order and harmony, can, paradoxically, only be sustained as a product of a formally (representationally) ordered and harmonious appearance. The critical-emancipatory disquietude is not a compromise of the order and harmony, but rather a reflection of its uncompromisingly egalitarian nature.

Kohoutovíce is my interpretation of urban district moving on the edge of village and cold war urban development. Duality who are giving into context grew old buildings and cold war development as a place with exception identity. Identity based on mutual disharmony forming a function unit when one part complements other. Action causes a reaction. Culture Social center with the Town Hall as the main bearer of the idea of mutual penetration between coexistence looking for its history and future. Instead of overlap, which aims to reflect both the present and future needs and significantly cities and boroughs, necessary for quality of living and use. The project implements existing hall located on the border of the original buildings, but also in direct contact with another typical feature of the whole territory, and panel buildings. Duality, otherness, diversity as incompatible interaction forming a single center of gravity in one place. Persona grata.

[pt] No final dos anos 1960, os projetos arquitetônicos em grandes escalas foram desacreditados no Ocidente por estarem associados à presença dos Poderes vigentes. Influenciados pelos ideais de Maio de 1968, os arquitetos ocidentais passaram a procurar modelos alternativos, baseados na linguagem histórica. Eles buscavam com isso alcançar a autonomia da forma arquitetônica, esvaziando-a do suposto conteúdo ideológico, que estaria aderido às formas abstratas modernas. No entanto, o enfoque pós-moderno nos elementos formais do objeto arquitetônico e do espaço urbano implicava no abandono da questão urbanística na escala metropolitana. Esta escala espacial seria marcada pela perda das referências às estruturas formais orgânicas. No Japão, a pesquisa moderna em grandes escalas não foi interrompida, oferecendo um amplo instrumental para a questão urbanística contemporânea. Esta dissertação verifica como os arquitetos Fumihiko Maki e Rem Koolhaas propõem a retomada e a revisão do urbanismo moderno metropolitano. Eles partem do pressuposto de que a Forma arquitetônica seria vazia de significados intrínsecos. A apropriação por parte dos Poderes e, também, por parte das pessoas imprimiria à arquitetura significados, retirando dos arquitetos a responsabilidade sobre a totalidade do projeto e devolvendo-lhes a legitimidade da disciplina. Esta pesquisa percorre os caminhos seguidos por esses arquitetos a partir de suas referências orientais e ocidentais, mostrando como, em diversos momentos, os conceitos arquitetônicos dos dois mundos convergem, apontando a persistência do pensamento moderno. / [en] By the end of the 1960s, large-scale architectural projects were discredited in West because they were associated with the established Power. Influenced by the ideals of May 1968, architects began searching alternative models based on the Historical language. They wanted to reach the autonomy of the architectural form by releasing it from their supposed ideological content, which was adhered to the abstract modern forms. Nevertheless, the post-modern approach, which was based on formal elements of the architectonical object and of the urban space, implied in the relinquishment of the metropolitan-scale. This urban-scale would be characterized by the references loss of organic formal structures. In Japan, modern research on large-scales was not interrupted, offering an important arsenal to the questions of contemporary urbanism. This dissertation verifies how the architects Fumihiko Maki and Rem Koolhaas propose the retaking and revision of modern metropolitan urbanism. They presuppose that architectonical Form is devoid of intrinsic meaning. Its appropriation by Power and also by people gives it meaning, removing architects responsibility on the totality of the project and giving them back the legitimacy of the discipline. This research follows the paths opened by these two architects through their Eastern and Western references, revealing the many instances in which architectonical concepts of both worlds converge, aiming to the persistence of modern thought.

This thesis aims to reveal paradigms associated with the operation of Western architectural oligarchies. The research is an examination into "how" dominant architectural institutions and their figureheads are undermined through the subversive collaboration of younger, unrecognised architects. By appropriating theories found in Jacques Derrida's writings in philosophy, the thesis interprets the evolution of post World War II polemical architectural thinking as a series of political friendships. In order to provide evidence, the thesis involves the rewriting of a portion of modern architectural history, 1949-1987. Modern architectural history is rewritten as a series of three friendship partnerships which have been selected because of their subversive reaction to their respective establishments. They are English architects, Alison Smithson and Peter Smithson; South African born architect and planner, Denise Scott Brown and North American architect, Robert Venturi; and Greek architect, Elia Zenghelis and Dutch architect, Rem Koolhaas. Crucial to the undermining of their respective enemies is the friends' collaboration on subversive projects. These projects are built, unbuilt and literary. Warring publicly through the writing of seminal texts is a significant step towards undermining the dominance of their ideological opponents. It also appears that through the making of these projects, the unrecognised architects are able to convert themselves to being recognised as new figureheads. This thesis contends that as a consequence of the power within each of the three friendship partnerships, the architects are enabled to collaborate against the dominant ideology of their respective enemies and gain status. It also contends that a cycle of friendship and warring is the political system by which the institution of modern architecture has historically reengineered itself to suit the times.

This thesis explores the various meanings and implications of transparency in architecture and in learning environments in particular. Architectural transparency, achieved through choice of materials and principles of formal composition, creates a diversity of relationships and can facilitate visual, conceptual, and functional clarity as well as offering simultaneous perception of different spaces. It offers a range of phenomenological qualities and so provides an opportunity to explore and complicate such dichotomies as translucency and opacity, openness and closure, and public space and private space. While celebrated throughout modern and contemporary architecture, transparency raises issues of privacy and safety even as it breaks down hierarchies and social boundaries. The research-based design of transparency in a school building necessitates careful planning to achieve a balance between the access to views, natural light, fresh air, and social interaction that transparency may bring and the continuing obligation to provide a safe, secure environment for schoolchildren.