Dominant aesthetics of modernity-coloniality in the practice and teaching of architecture. The case of Quito-Ecuador

Abstract

Architectural forms reveal the characteristics of societies and vice versa, as both sides are in mutual adjustment and transformation. Although Ecuadorian architecture at the end of the 20th century opened its scope to diversity in topics and research, little has been reflected on aesthetic preferences. This work argues that the emergence and persistence of dominant aesthetics identified with modernity in Ecuadorian architecture precede the heyday of the modern movement of the twentieth century; rather, it is a long-standing process deeply anchored to a colonial matrix. This is evidenced by the architectural practice linked to the ideal of a modernity located in the Global North, which shows the predominance of modernity as a permanent aspiration. These practices are reflected later through an educational process strongly linked to external references that otherwise omit the knowledge, and recognition of other peripheral and localized modernities. Methodologically, this work has an exploratory-descriptive scope with heuristic analysis from a bibliographic research phase followed by a phase of interviews. The findings are discussed as emerging topics considering the theoretical contributions of Latin American decolonial thought to contribute to a historical-interdisciplinary analysis of architecture.