Brutalism: from architectural movement to global trend

The term “Brutalism” derives from béton brut (which means “raw cement” in French), and also refers to the raw art of Jean Dubuffet and informal painting.

The term became more widespread after the Second World War, particularly in the field of architecture, but has enjoyed huge Pop diffusion over the last decade.

To trace its origins, we need to go back to the 1950s. The British architect Alison Smithson was one of the first to use the word in an architectural project narrative – for a small house in Soho previously described using the definition “warehouse aesthetic.”  The Smithsons declared that, “if built, the house would have embodied the first example of New Brutalism in England,” as the preamble to the specifications shows. The structure was intended to be completely exposed, without any internal finishes where possible. The contractor was to aim for a high standard of basic construction, as in a small warehouse.

In an essay entitled The New Brutalism, published in 1955 by the British journal The Architectural Review, the critic Reyner Banham clearly set out the essential characteristics of the architectural style: “1, Memorability as an Image; 2, Clear exhibition of Structure; and 3, Valuation of Materials ‘as found.”

Contextually to the historical period and the rise of new “-isms” in the artistic and cultural fields, the British theorist maintained that Brutalism was first and foremost “a banner, a slogan, a policy consciously adopted by a group of artists, whatever the apparent similarity or dissimilarity of their products.”  In his essay, Banham analyses the characteristics of this architectural movement at length, attempting to outline which works to include and, above all, which to exclude.

While Le Corbusier with his famous Unité d’Habitation in Marseille (1948) is seen as one of the forerunners and fundamental references of Brutalism, another great master, such as Louis Kahn along with his Yale Center for British Art (1953), have no place in the narrow  field formulated by the critic.

Brutalist architecture spread globally during the second half of the twentieth century, but with different vocabularies and meanings in each country. Despite starting off as an architectural style, it can no longer still be considered a true, theoretically defined current, rather assuming an aesthetic form that  cuts across different styles. There are examples of brutalist architecture all over the world, from Italy to Brazil and Qatar to Japan, by way of Russia and the United States. The brutality of concrete  characterises a great many monuments, churches, residential buildings, viaducts,  housing complexes, cemeteries and unfinished projects, dialoguing with different styles and materials to give life to different, eclectic and inconsistent interpretations.

Much, therefore, has been written about Brutalism and its local applications. Among those most worthy of mention is the recent publication Brutalist Italy: Concrete Architecture from the Alps to the Mediterranean Sea, by the photographers Roberto Conte and Stefano Perego. The publisher Phaidon has also just produced the Atlas of Brutalist Architecture, a large global compendium of brutalist architecture which also includes a number of buildings that no longer exist.