Brasília: Concrete Dream in the Central Plateau

President Juscelino Kubitschek’s idea was to make government management more efficient and to occupy the then-isolated Central-West region, bringing “civilization” to these corners of the country. That was the official discourse.

In fact, the ambition was to neutralize the power of public opinion in the old federal district. It was also a form of “revenge of the hinterland against the cosmopolitanism of Rio de Janeiro,” as sociologist Marcelo Coelho defined it.

The construction of Brasília was approved in 1956, when JK took office, and the city was officially inaugurated on April 21, 1960. The new capital had been part of the national imagination since the 19th century, idealized by the Patriarch of Independence José Bonifácio de Andrada e Silva.

To forge this dream of concrete, curves, and steel, which had an uncertain budget and faced opposition from politicians and industrialists in Rio and São Paulo, the Companhia Urbanizadora da Nova Capital (Novacap) was created, a state-owned company responsible for civil construction.

The developmental spirit of the JK years — and his Goal Plan to industrialize Brazil and advance 50 years in five — led to the choice of the Pilot Plan, led by the precursor of modernist architecture in the country, Lúcio Costa, and his colleague Oscar Niemeyer.

Oscar Niemeyer was invited by President Juscelino Kubitschek to design the public buildings of Brasília. The photo was part of the exhibition ‘Images of Fact - 80 Years of Folha,’ held at the São Paulo Museum of Art (MASP) between August 21 and September 23, 2001.

Architect Oscar Niemeyer talks to journalist Samuel Wainer, one of the initial opponents to the transfer of the federal capital to the Central Plateau.

Detail of the original design of Brasília’s Pilot Plan produced by the architect Lúcio Costa in 1957, which won the competition for Brasília’s construction. In the caption is the detail: proposal dated 1936 by the French architect, urban planner, sculptor, and painter Le Corbusier.

Original board with the design of the Pilot Plan of Brasília produced by the architect Lúcio Costa in 1957, which won the competition for Brasília’s construction.

President Juscelino Kubitschek (in the center, wearing a hat), in the middle of the cerrado, during a visit to construction work on Brasília.

President Juscelino Kubitschek waves from the Romi-Isetta in the National Integration Caravan, made up of columns of vehicles from all over the country. A mass was held on the construction site of the future cathedral to celebrate the meeting of the columns, which arrived on the new roads.

Reporter José Hamilton Ribeiro and photographer Antônio Pirozzelli Pirozzelli meet President Juscelino Kubitschek in Brasília. The duo participated in the Folha de S.Paulo project ‘Reide Brazil-North-South,’ which covered 25,000 kilometers of roads in a DKW Vemag jeep.

Bar Uberlândia, in Cidade Livre (Free City). Opened in 1956, the temporary dwelling of the candangos, workers who built Brasília, was close to the works. The lands were granted in the form of a loan for use, and a commercial center was formed with bars, grocery stores, and a pharmacy.

With the inauguration of the new federal capital, the loan contracts were canceled and the merchants moved to the North Wing. Low-income families occupied the lands and mobilized for the Free City to remain.

The construction work in Brasília attracted a huge contingent of migrants, mostly from the Northeast and Southeast, in search of opportunities. In 2020, Candango Day (celebrated every September 12) was established.

The Esplanade of Ministries and the National Congress in the background, in Brasília.

Authorities occupy the Parlatorium of the Planalto Palace, with the Palace of the Supreme Federal Court in the background, during Brasília’s inauguration on April 21, 1960.

Inauguration ceremony of the city, at the Metropolitan Cathedral Nossa Senhora Aparecida in Brasília, still without the famous stained glass windows, colored by the artist Marianne Peretti. The foundation stone was laid in 1958 and the work was completed in 1960, but it was only inaugurated in 1970.

President Juscelino Kubitschek (center), next to First Lady Sarah Kubitschek de Oliveira and guests, during the inauguration ceremony of the Federal District.

Candangos, as the workers who built Brasília became known, parade in FNM trucks at the inauguration of the federal capital.