Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro: um epicentro do design moderno brasileiro (1948 a 1978)

Abstract

The work delineates an investigation on the contribution of the Museu de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro to the history of modern Brazilian design. Since its foundation, the institution has had the desire to implement teaching and research facilities, as well as the vocation for the stimulation and dissemination of exemplary modern design, becoming a great promoter of the field and the vanguards that have based it. All the proposed activities with this focus were intended to educate the taste of men, with the ambition of their adherence to the modern spirit, inserted in a society that had been undergoing serious transformations. Given the scarcity of published studies in our historiography that comprise the subject matter, it was crucial to develop research, compilations, organization and examination of documents from diverse sources, especially those stored in the Museum’s archives. They record the respective events that occurred in the period that goes from 1948, the year when the institution was been founded, to the date of fire that hit it in 1978. The time frame of the research coincides with the rise of initiatives in the country to institutionalize the design field and to implement it as a discipline. For this reason, it is said that the origins of modern Brazilian design are confounded with those of MAM Rio. Direct evidence of the resonances of these actions are limited. However, radial influences are propagated. It is expected that this work will contribute to studies in the field so we can, finally, remount, in a more assured way, fundamental episodes in the history of modern Brazilian design.