Document versus monument: a history to be preserved and a building to be destroyed

Abstract

Nowadays, mainly in the São Paulo scenario (Brazil), we follow a series of concessions for the private initiative of managing works considered important landmarks of the city. Without any type of counterpart from the State that preservation, such buidigns are the sense of companies that often do not consider the cultural value a point to be quantified in their interventions, resulting in irreparable losses. The text proposes, based on the example of Parque Anhembi, to report some specific points of the case, but which show the urgency of putting such conduct from a theoretical and practical point of view. Such a review replaces it in a very simplified way, but suggests the urgency of a more qualified discussion in official decisions, which necessarily involves understanding three points: the difference between cultural value and use value, the definition of what is a monument and a historic monument and in understanding what the terms “document” and “monument” mean. It is hoped that at least it will be possible to understand the role of architecture as a material support capable of bringing to light some paths taken in the past and, consequently, as material that feeds our future.