ARCHITECTURAL WORLD

Designed by Carlos Raúl Villanueva, completed 1977 Caracas, Venezuela The Ciudad Universitaria of Caracas (City University of Caracas, also known as the Universidad Central de Venezuela [UCV] or Central University of Venezuela), designed by the Venezuelan architect Carlos Raúl Villanueva, is regarded as the country’s most important example of modernist architecture. Derived from Le Corbusier’s works, the campus plan’s Venezuelaninflected organicism set a new standard for Venezuelan architects. The “synthesis of the arts” it proposed has never been surpassed. Despite the dilemma its association with the military government of General Marcos Pérez Jiménez (1948–58) presented for artists working on the project, its success with both Venezuelan elites and the international architectural community significantly influenced the course of Venezuelan architecture. Villanueva’s initial conception of the campus plan as well as early building designs make use of monumental axes and symmetrical dis...

Mexico City, Mexico The Mexican National University, founded in 1553 by order of the Spanish emperor Charles V, is the oldest university on the American continent. Institutes and colleges of Entries A–F 503 the National University were located in the historical center of Mexico City, but in the 1940s, the structural problems of organizing the increasing academic activities led Mexican politicians to commission plans for a new campus in the southern periphery of the city. Inspired by Madrid’s university city of 1927 and by the tradition in the United States of suburban campus and university planning, the Mexican planners designated a seven-million-square-meter site of lava landscape at the Pedregal de San Angel for the university city. In 1953, four centuries after its foundation, the entire National University moved to Ciudad Universitaria. The project of constructing a university city following contemporary urban planning and architecture standards had high symbolic importance for the...