Page 168 - Libro Max Cetto

In Cetto’s Proximity

Fig. 13. San José Purúa Hotel and Spa with Jorge Rubio (1940). © Archivo Max Cetto, UAM Azcapotzalco, Mexico.

The experience in San José Purúa, Michoacán, from 1939 to 1940, would reinforce
Cettoʼs preference for modern, artisanal architecture, built with local labor and materials
and rooted in the landscape. Cetto and Rubio conceived a vernacular, strongly expressionist
architecture for this site. Walter Gropius, who was a very good friend of Cetto’s, had postu-
lated the union of art and technique twenty years earlier, arguing that the age of craftsmanship
was over. In 1946, Gropius visited the hotel and wrote to Cetto: “The work at San José
appeals to me very much indeed. One needs imagination to implant a building among the
rocks. The concept of different levels is carried out in a masterly fashion.” 15
Gropius’ critique is significant because, in San José Purúa, Cetto and Rubio were
swimming against the local current, characterized by art decó and neocolonial styles, while
younger Mexican architects were influenced by the works of 1920s Europe. In San José
Purúa, Cetto and Rubio respected the topography, views, existing vegetation, trees, rocks.
They did not just respect the terrain, it constituted their point of departure. As Susanne
Dussel writes:

In San José Purúa, Cetto developed the entire tradition that had shaped him. If we did
not know Cetto’s expressionist past, his apprenticeship with Poelzig, his knowledge of
the work of Sharoun, Häring and Le Corbusier, his time with Wright and Neutra, it
would be the fruit of chance and not the result of a long road and an authentic explora-
tion for nearly twenty years. 16
15 Quote from a letter from Walter Gropius to Max Cetto, in Ida Rodríguez Prampolini, “Cetto, Max,” in Emanuel
Muriel, ed., Contemporary Architects (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1980).
16 Dussel, Max Cetto (1903-1980), 147.

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