Jean-François Zevaco (,1916–2003) was a French-Moroccan

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs, and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

born in

Casablanca Casablanca (, ) is the largest city in Morocco and the country's economic and business centre. Located on the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic coast of the Chaouia (Morocco), Chaouia plain in the central-western part of Morocco, the city has a populatio ...

. He is considered an emblematic figure of the

modernist Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...

architectural movement in Morocco and in Africa, and his legacy is important in terms of the number of constructions built across Morocco, the diversity of his works, and their international aura. After his finishing his studies at the

École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts École or Ecole may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine The Seine ( , ) is a river in nor ...

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

and

Marseille Marseille (; ; see #Name, below) is a city in southern France, the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Departments of France, department of Bouches-du-Rhône and of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur Regions of France, region. Situated in the ...

in 1945, he established a private practice in

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

and started a career spanning from 1947 to 1999. He marked the architecture of the second half of the 20th century with a resolutely modern work in intense dialogue with the country, the people, and the landscapes surrounding him.

Biography

Zevaco was born in Casablanca on August 8, 1916, to a French family from

Corsica Corsica ( , , ; ; ) is an island in the Mediterranean Sea and one of the Regions of France, 18 regions of France. It is the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, fourth-largest island in the Mediterranean and lies southeast of the Metro ...

. Zevaco entered the National School of Fine Arts in Paris in 1937 where he joined the Pontrémoli-Leconte studio. He continued his studies in Marseille in the studio of Eugène Beaudoin during the Nazi occupation of northern France during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. He returned to Casablanca after the war and opened a makeshift agency by occupying and arranging the veranda of the family house. He then settled with his partner Paul Messina at rue Bugeaud, and then opened his own agency at 7 Passage Sumica. He began his career designing private villas such as Villa Suissa (1949), also known as "la Pagode," and Villa Gilardi (1949), with his collaborator Paul Messina. Aziza Chaouni described this building as Zevaco's reaction to California modern architecture. In contrast with post-war Europe, Casablanca was at midcentury an expanding town attracting investment from all over the world, a city in the midst of "euphoria" and a fertile field for architectural experimentation, which Zevaco fully embraced. His white villas with huge overhangs and incisive sunscreens were "scandalous" both for their contrast with the neo-Moorish architecture of the colonial administration and for the audacity and technical prowess in the use of concrete. In the early 1950s, he joined the Group of Moroccan Modern Architects (GAMMA)—the Moroccan branch of the International Congress of Modern Architecture (CIAM)—when it was created by Michel Ecochard. The GAMMA's activities would continue up until 1959. Around this time, Zevaco built the Vincent Timsit Factory (1952) in the Roches Noires district in eastern Casablanca. After the Independence of the country, a continuity of language and discourse is indeed conveyed by many founding members of the group remained in Morocco and who defend a modernity based on a relationship to the local site and the climate. Against the current of international-type functionalism and like the post-war Brazilian or Mexican situated modernism, Zevaco produced a singular and Moroccan work, an architecture-sculpture sublimely innervated by the time and the space in which he evolves. In Tit Mellil, Zevaco designed the Casablanca Tit Mellil Airport (1953) with Dominique Basciano, and the Tit Mellil Rehabilitation Center (1960). Zevaco changed the landscape in Casablanca with his brutalist schools, such as the Théophile Gautier School (1960). Zevaco designed the Sidi Harazem Thermal Bath Complex, named after Ali ibn Harzihim, with

brutalist Brutalist architecture is an architectural style that emerged during the 1950s in the United Kingdom, among the reconstruction projects of the post-war era. Brutalist buildings are characterised by minimalist constructions that showcase the b ...

architecture combined with local elements, such as blue ''zeliij'' and copper. He renovated United Nations Square in 1974 with his ''Kora Ardia'' ( ''Globe'') underground passageway.

Agadir reconstruction

Zevaco was a member of the (GAMMA). He worked with GAMMA colleagues, including Elie Azagury and Mourad Ben Embarek, in the reconstruction of Agadir after the 1960 earthquake. In 1965, Zevaco designed courtyard houses in Agadir that would later earn him an

Aga Khan Award for Architecture The Aga Khan Award for Architecture (AKAA) is an architectural prize established by Aga Khan IV in 1977. It aims to identify and reward architectural concepts that successfully address the needs and aspirations of Muslim societies in the fie ...

Latin American influences

Zevaco's Assuna Mosque in Casablanca, designed in a modernist style in the 1970s, drew inspiration from Oscar Niemeyer's Church of Saint Francis of Assisi in Pampulha,

Belo Horizonte Belo Horizonte is the List of largest cities in Brazil, sixth-largest city in Brazil, with a population of around 2.3 million, and the third largest metropolitan area, containing a population of 6 million. It is the List of cities in Sout ...

. His Agadir Street Market (1975) draws from Pedro Ramírez Vázquez. Zevaco was exposed to this architecture through L'Architecture d'Aujourd'hui, a French architecture magazine.

Awards

Jean-François Zevaco received the

in the 1978-1980 cycle for his 1965 Courtyard Houses in Agadir, Morocco.

Main works

References

External links

* MAMMA.'s archives
Jean-François Zevaco
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zevaco, Jean-Francois 1916 births 2003 deaths French architects People from Casablanca