School to build a city. Origin and reiteration in school architecture in La Araucanía, Chile

Abstract

The consolidation of the republican state in Chile at the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century aimed to democratize the cultural and architectural modernity as a form of civilizational consolidation. In this context, the establishment of public service infrastructures was a widespread task throughout the country. Thus, the possibility that productive processes typical of industrialization were expressed in some cases through the repetition of buildings was recurrent. Among others, educational establishments were programs conducive to formal standardization. The findings place them in smaller cities in Chile; among them, some in La Araucanía stand out as a sign of the State’s attention to supporting the constitution of the nation state in a territory of recent occupation. This paper explores the morphological, programmatic, architectural, and urban developments that the State arranged to impose an image of institutional efficiency, social progress, and willingness to modernizing change.