"Lo español" en la arquitectura de las primeras décadas del siglo XX: Miradas e imágenes a ambas orillas del Atlántico

Abstract

In the project entitled "Images of Spain in the rioplatense architecture" we analyzed the impressions of the famous Argentine architect Martí­n Noel, in his travel book 'España vista otra vez', written and published in Spain while he was leading the construction of Argentine Pavillion at the 1929 Seville Ibero-American Exhibition. We were going to begin another project, when we found by chance a rare Spanish book with a Noel foreword. We are refering to the volume "Casas de campo españolas", by Alfredo Baeschlin, Swiss architect who lived in Spain from the beginning of the First World War to 1942. The book has fifty projects of "typical" houses from different regions of Spain and has profusión of plans, perspectives and texts that highlight their functional virtues and their respect for the "Spanish" character. We think that this is an opportunity to analyze what was meant by "the Spanish" architecture, in the twenties on both sides of the Atlantic, cross-examining views of the European an American authors with the particularity that, none of them were Spanish