1912 Nobel Prize in Medicine. Carrel’ s writings of the 1930s often touched upon the “degeneration” of contemporary hu- manity and proposed the elimination of those who might impede the continued im- provement of the human race. These are ideas more commonly associated with Nazi Germany than with an architect-hero such as Le Corbusier. Here is López-Durán’ s checkmate move. She writes, “It was in Rio during that summer of 1936 that Le Cor- busier publicly aligned with Carrel’ s eugenic ideology, establishing a direct con- nection between Carrel’ s ideas and his own” (158). This statement is supported by several documents: a letter from Carrel to Le Corbusier dated 31 August 1937, a postcard dated 1942, and Le Corbusier’ s notes on Carrel’ s lecture of 19 February 1943, a moment when both men were col- laborating with the German-aligned Vichy Republic. Little of this will be entirely new to informed historians, yet somehow much of López-Durán’ s evidence has been ne- glected or submerged for many decades. For instance, she features two of Le Cor- busier’ s drawings of the Ministry of Educa- tion in Rio. One is of the original unbuilt proposal of 1936, the other was done at the end of World War II and was based on a photograph—sent to Le Corbusier by Lucio Costa—of the completed building. Seeking to claim authorship of a magnifi- cent structure built in Brazil before he could do anything on a comparable scale in Europe, Le Corbusier backdated the latter drawing, making it appear to have been made in 1936 and published soon after. These are the sorts of seemingly minor details that we overlook all the time, until we decide to stop doing so. Fabiola López-Durán decided not to overlook such evidence, and this is the most significant contribution of Eugenics in the Garden. She rigorously analyzes pri- mary documents pertaining to the ex- change of ideas among France, Brazil, and Argentina to illuminate processes and exclusions that we can no longer avoid. In her words, “Eugenics, which in the early twentieth century was used to justify the exclusion of Africans, Asians, and even immigrants from southern and eastern Europe in an attempt to normalize a patri- archal society, ideally white and heterosex- ual, is now reactivated, and with it, racism and segregation have once again been officially legitimized” (190). Ideas such as those that motivated the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville in August 2017 often seem as if drawn from the dustbin of history and are frequently dismissed as extremist outliers. In fact, such ideas have long been far more widespread and common than we might like to admit. According to Arturo Escobar, moderniza- tion has always benefited a white male het- eronormative minority, to the exclusion of the majority of people on our small planet. The surprise is how little we have discussed this fact in architectural scholarship. In this regard, López-Durán’ s book is a timely and powerful contribution to the slow disman- tling of a Eurocentric and sometimes— directly or indirectly—white supremacist history of architecture. FERNANDO LUIZ LARA University of Texas at Austin Notes 1. Arturo Escobar, Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World (Prince- ton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1995). 2. See Roberto Fernández, El laboratorio ameri- cano: Arquitectura, geocultura y regionalismo (Ma- drid: Biblioteca Nueva, 1998). Catherine Seavitt Nordenson Depositions: Roberto Burle Marx and Public Landscapes under Dictatorship Austin: University of Texas Press, 2018, 336 pp., 20 maps, 161 b/w illus. $45 (cloth), ISBN 9781477315736 Roberto Burle Marx is well known for his innovative, abstract, tropical modernist landscape designs, and for his advocacy in protecting Brazil’ s natural landscapes and exotic flora. His first commission, com- pleted in 1932 with the architects Gregori Warchavchik and Lúcio Costa, marked the beginning of his many collaborations with Costa and, later, Oscar Niemeyer. Burle Marx’ s designs are widely admired and have influenced many subsequent land- scape designers around the world. His work has been celebrated in numerous exhibitions, including recent shows at the Museum of Brazilian Sculpture in São Paulo and the Jewish Museum in New York. Catherine Seavitt Nordenson’ s Depositions: Roberto Burle Marx and Public Landscapes under Dictatorship interrogates Burle Marx’ s legacy, exploring the nuances of his role as a designer, conservationist, and public figure working under Brazil’ s dictatorial military government, which lasted from 1964 until 1985. Nordenson analyzes eighteen position papers, or depositions, that Burle Marx presented and published from 1967 to 1974 while serving on the advisory board of the Ministry of Education and Culture and as a member of the Federal Council of Cul- ture. Addressing issues of land conservation and the ecological devastation of Brazilian landscapes, Burle Marx generally opposed the government’ s strategy for national de- velopment. Nordenson provides a thor- ough analysis of his papers, using them to examine the often-contradictory historical, political, and social circumstances of Brazil- ian life during the repressive anos de chumbo (years of lead)—the regime’ s most brutal period but also an era of unprecedented economic growth, one remembered by many as the milagre economico, or economic miracle. Even as intellectual and creative communities were persecuted or fled the country, Burle Marx voluntarily collabo- rated with the dictatorship as a cultural ad- viser, demonstrating both his hope for change and his consent to repressive rule. Burle Marx’ s situation prompts Nor- denson to reflect on the frequently com- plex and conflicted positions of design professionals working under dictatorial regimes, and to consider how aesthetics can blind us to the troubling circumstances underlying many prominent modernist landscapes and buildings. 1 She reminds us that Niemeyer, having left Brazil in these years because of his Communist Party affil- iation, nonetheless returned frequently to manage his ongoing work at the new capi- tal city of Brasília. Burle Marx also pro- duced several projects there for the military government, including landscapes for the Ministry of Foreign Relations (1965), the Ministry of the Army (1970), and the National Accounts Tribunal (1973). He owed his appointment to the Federal Council of Culture, Nordenson explains, to alliances with some of the most powerful figures in Brazilian politics. He and Niemeyer were hardly alone in their collaborations with the dictatorship. Artists and intellectuals such as Gilberto Freyre, 488 JSAH | 78.4 | DECEMBER 2019