Brasilia embodies the nation’s Latin American urban utopia. City-fairy tale, garden-eden. Lack of a classic center. Separate traffic systems have been developed for pedestrians, private and public transport. Since that territory was an arid area, the first reservoir was built. With the help of dams, lakes and reservoirs were formed.
The city was designed and built according to a single plan. The clear plan of the city has clearly symbolic features – the sketch of the general plan resembles a huge bird, from wide-spread wings it is directed deep into undeveloped territory. The symbolism of the bird evokes direct associations with the mythological representations of the aborigines of pre-Columbian America, where the image of the bird was of great importance and, at the same time, may be borrowed from Egyptian mythology. This plan also resembles a cross. The monumental axis of Brasilia is about 10 km, the span of the “wings” formed by the “super-squares” of residential buildings is about 14 km. Along this axis, the composition of the government center of the capital is sequentially unfolded. The palaces of Government and Justice are quite the same type, but differently deployed buildings with pylons, located in the plan at the tops of an equilateral triangle, symbolizing the equality of legislative, executive and judicial powers.
The theme of the parity of compositional elements – similar or contrasting in form, volume and functionality – is consistently and actively carried out throughout the ensemble of the government center of Brasilia. However, in the work of Niemeyer, the symmetry of paired elements is not static, but openly unbalanced, extremely dynamic and is based either on the search for asymmetry, or, more often, on contrasting oppositions of the pair (dome and charm, – the meeting rooms of the chambers of the National Congress – the Senate and the House of Representatives designed with functionality in mind forms, thus creating excellent acoustics). The twin skyscrapers of the National Congress on a horizontal platform dominated the square. In these structures, Niemeyer also developed new forms for supports, which gave the buildings a significant lightness.