Clorindo Testa, a centennial tribute

Abstract

Sometimes good things happen entirely by chance. It is the case of this little book. Its origin can be traced back to a telephone conversation about a completely different subject that I had in May 2023 with Joaquina Testa, Clorindo Testa’s daughter and president of the Fundación Clorindo Testa (Buenos Aires, Argentina). In that conversation we informally explored the possibility that the Illinois Architecture Study Abroad Program at BarcelonaEl Vallès (the flagship study abroad program of the Illinois School of Architecture, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, also known as the “Barcelona Program”) and its host institution, the Escola Superior d’Arquitectura del Vallès of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya) jointly organize a modest exhibition of Testa’s architectural legacy to commemorate the centennial of his birth. One and a half years later, that informal conversation materialized with the organization of the exhibition Clorindo Testa, a centennial tribute and a round table dedicated to celebrating his work. This book comprises aspects of both; on one hand, it works as a sort of catalogue of the images displayed in the exhibition, while on the other, it includes eight rather personal approximations to the work of Testa by the specially invited guests who participated in the round table held at the exhibit’s opening on December 16, 2024. The main objective of the entire project was to celebrate the work of this extraordinary architect, but in parallel, our intention is to disseminate his work, especially to an audience that, because of geographical and generational distances, may not be familiar with the transcendence of his architectural oeuvre. Based on a preliminary selection made by Federica Conte, a young Italian architect and researcher of Testa’s work, the exhibit presents a brief selection of some of the architect’s most significant buildings, from the emblematic and internationally praised Banco de Londres y América del Sur (1956-1959) to some of his late work such as the Auditorio for the Universidad del Salvador (1998-2000). For the most part, this book includes the same documents (preliminary sketches, drawings, photographs) displayed in the exhibition; however, there are a few exceptions in both directions, that is, some images included in the book are not displayed in the exhibit (notably most of the images that illustrate the texts), and vice versa, not all the images shown in the exhibit are included in this volume. In closing, we hope that those who have known Clorindo Testa and his work enjoy this little book as a heartful tribute, and that those who are not familiar with it discover the work of one of the most original and greatest architects of the last seventy years.