Eugenio Brito created multiple murals for the Federico Santa Mara Technical University (UTFSM) in Valparaiso, as well as the campuses in Viña del Mar and Talcahuano. Due to its neo-Tudor façade, the most monumental are those found in its center house in the port, in the entrance hall. Each mural covers 16.20 square meters and was created in 1972 in acrylic paint on a support of two linked sheets of fiberglass with resin measuring three by 2.7 meters each, for a total size of 3 by 5.4 meters for each painting. The works were created as a visible institutional reflection of the goals and strong ideas agreed upon and approved by the university community in the reforming cloisters. Those whom Eugenio Brito accepts and reworks with his own formal and iconic lexicon.
Mural at the left
In this painting, the artist inserted his own reference components, which can be summarized in the following strong ideas: 1) the awakening of a community to social consciousness; 2) the role of technology in Chile’s development (the construction of a nation); 3) the UTFSM as a generator, guardian, and transmitter of technical, humanistic, and universal knowledge; 4) knowledge transfer between generations; institutional engagement in the remodeling of society and the nation via campuses and headquarters in the remodeling of society and the national and global ethos; 5) study and research distribution as a tool for human and societal growth; 6) and belief in the humanistic function that technology must play in order to be of service to man, while cautioning that it must be integrative rather than isolating.
Through the generating power of its images, Brito’s genius was able to create the plastic concretion of this program on the basis of his detected desires with a natural, mature creativity without succumbing to expressionist stridencies. These speak from human depths and inspire us to ponder their philosophical content, which is expressed in clear and distinct language.
This mural is presented as a tremendous game of viewpoints, one global and the other sectorized and expressed intelligibly. This facilitates and aids in the execution of many visual paths, as well as becoming aware of Eugenio Brito’s mastery of compositional and symbolic themes. It’s because he arranges, connects, and combines all the different chromatic planes with functional expertise to make and communicate important specialties at the service of vanishing points that catch the eye through their conjugation. All of this lends the mural a strong presence, integrating and enriching the huge architectural space into which it is put and visually reinforcing the attraction of this wonderful getaway that captures and captivates attention. These magnetic roads inspire us to follow the various topographical configurations arranged in the work by using generous color and tone ranges. It indicates the aforementioned thematic paths with this subtle hook, enabling readers to not only be conscious of the messages inscribed in the expressive strength of its symbols but also to find and make up new contents due to the clarity of its metaphors. Plastic images that underpin the general composition of its transcendent correlate, highlighting the core ideals that comprise the university campus’s culture.
Mural at the right
The left mural discusses the genesis and nature of the UTFSM as a receiver and transmitter of scientific and technological knowledge, its academic formative function, and its national and social significance, whereas the right mural discusses the background of such knowledge and its projections. For which the artist employs the same lexicon of volumetrics, perspectives, and polar ranges around cold and warm from the color spectrum, emphasizing the following strong ideas: stages of humanity’s acquisition of consciousness; the beginnings of knowledge and the passage of time; the formalization of knowledge and its institutionalization; the permanent process of society’s construction and transformation; the social hope of technological contribution; and the contribution that UTFSM makes in this sense.
A double geometrization dominates in the artist’s plastic strategy at the service of two prominent vanishing points that divide, center, and articulate the work. one oriented obliquely from the left base to the right center, indicating a crucial point. The other requirements attract all of the diagonal lines, changing the earlier projections towards an axis centered at the top, which absorbs the huge face that dominates and provides meaning to the mural in the golden portion.
There are two polar vibration zones in color and its chromatic distribution. The bottom one is a low vibration centered on blues that mixes with all of its tonal variants, loading those that reach white on the left and those that reach black on the right. High vibrations, on the other hand, predominate in the higher parts, manifested in beams and volumes that flow between violet-brown and complementary colors, mixing with similar ones in the front mural’s upper area.
All of the volumes ascend, transformed into pieces orientated towards a head under construction, half empty, lighted by varied colors of violet radiation. It is the theme’s pinnacle, heralding a bright and luminous dawn for civilization if it makes good use of technology. His expressionless and stern classical reference face appears to be made of white marble, cold and polished, with elevated areas still rough. The interior of the head is empty save for modulated niches, the majority of which are transparent and allow the sky to be viewed, evoking the interior of the Roman Pantheon. A sky with clouds like a brain is seen. Floating volumes appear about the head, seeking a place in the coupling of said head in its many portions. In many of these volumes, little beings are seen assembling this head, which reflects social culture like a puzzle.
It is worth noting that the artist has given the face robotic and aseptic characteristics. His message is clear: he fears that exaggerated technology would mechanize man to the point where he would be stripped of his emotions and energy, causing him to become petrified and forcing humanity to commence a new cycle of existence, such as the one depicted in the artwork.
